Where can I find information about the Liberia study? Can you send me something from the Liberia study? ....
Roll of Emigrants to Liberia, 1820-1843
(Inquiry about additional study documentation not available online)

Q. I am doing research on the subject of Liberian Emigration between 1827- 1865. Can you please forward to me the list of emigrants from 1820-1843? If you can email me the information, that would be lovely!!!!

A. Thank you for your interest in our web site and the Liberian Online Data Archive. In response to your question, we can photocopy and send you the alphabetical list of emigrants, but we can not email the list to you:

"Supplementary Information Emigrants to Liberia, 1820-1843: An Alphabetical Listing. By Tom W. Shick, 1971. Liberian Studies Research Working Paper #2. Note: This paper is not available in machine-readable form. If you would like to acquire a copy from DPLS (for the cost of photocopying and mailing), please contact us by email or send a request to Data and Program Library Service, 3313 Social Sciences, 1180 Observatory Drive, Madison, WI, 53706", (http://dpls.dacc.wisc.edu/Liberia/index.html).

The raw data is freely downloadable from our web site, as is the online codebook. However, the alphabetical list of names can not be made machine-readable due to copyright issues. Within the alphabetical list of emigrants, information re: age, origin (U.S state), arrival point, level of literacy, occupation, age of death, cause of death and name of ship are also included. If you are interested in receiving a photocopy of the material which you are inquiring about, we can send this to you. However, we would need to bill you for the photocopying and shipping costs. If you can send us an email message containing your request, we would be glad to calculate the shipping cost & give you an estimate.

Q. I am researching the subject of public vouchers for private schools, for my college research paper. In Milwaukee, who exactly can receive the vouchers? Is it just people with low-income, or is it anyone who is attending a public school that is "failing" or in bad academic condition? (regardless of their economic status.) Because I came across conflicting information. One source said the vouchers were for low-income families and voucher schools must prove to the government that these people qualify. But, then it states, middle-class people, who are already sending their children to private schools, will end up benefiting because they have more money to spend on tuition. And do all states with this type of legislation vary on who they give vouchers to and upon what varying circumstances? (because of failing schools or to attempt to give the lower-class equal opportunity in education.)

A. Although we have an extensive online archival dataset titled, "The Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, 1990/1991 - 1994/1995", that Dr. Witte (a UW-Madison professor) deposited at our library, this dataset and our data archive pertaining to this subject area limited to the data files that you have probably already found on our web site, http://dpls.dacc.wisc.edu/choice/choice_index.html. I would go to the online codebook for each set of the data files included in this study (that are of interest to you) & examine whether or not the variables you are in search of have been provided. If you decide to download the Milwaukee Parental Choice datasets, the data files will need to expanded or decompressed using a GNZIP or WinZIP utility. The data files will appear in raw ASCII format. If upon registering to download the data, you are in need of additional technical assistance -- feel free to contact us.

If you are instead looking for published articles or other material in 'narrative format,' you might want to start with our online bibliographies of primary publications (based on the Milwaukee Parental Choice dataset) or secondary publications (about vouchers and parental choice in general.) For still more information, consider doing a lliterature search of an educational or social science journal database. Visit your local university library and also refer to the web site of the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction as well as web sites of equivalent agencies for other states.

Q. I'm interested in the following questions regarding the dataset: "Slave Trade to Havana, Cuba, 1790-1820."
1. Where exactly did the slaves come from? (Undoubtedly Africa but what region, what tribes?)
2. Were the first 300 slaves all captured from the same area in Africa or several locations?
3. What language did they speak?
Any information you can give me will be appreciated.

A. Thank you for your recent request for data and/or information. I do not think that the "Slave Trade to Havana, Cuba, 1790-1820" data files available online through the Data & Program Library Service (DPLS) contain the information that you are seeking. The variables in this study include "Cuban port of arrival, date of arrival, type of ship, nationality of ship, number of slaves landed, slave mortality, number of slaves by sex, name and captain of ship", http://dpls.dacc.wisc.edu/slavedata/slainfo9.html. Other variables not included in the study may not have been available to the researcher using the original data at the time the study was conducted.

There may be some information available from one of the organizations found among our list of related links, however, that may be of help to you and your research, http://dpls.dacc.wisc.edu/slavedata/slalinks.html.