Excel for Data Collection: Automating a Survey and Developing a Codebook

The purpose of this training is to help improve the quality of the data you collect, analyze, and store by mitigating manual data entry errors and cleaning inaccurate/not applicable data received. Data errors and inaccurate data can compromise the quality of the data used for analysis and reporting, however, there are ways to mitigate those issues before, during, and after data collection. The example workbook developed for this training demonstrates ways to mitigate manual errors and improve the quality of your data, using different sheets for different functions: Survey, Formula, Codebook, and Variable.

Learning Objectives

• Illustrate multiple ways to automate Survey question/answer options to decrease manual data entry errors.
• Illustrate a method to convert different data types into numerical data using a Formula sheet.
• Illustrate how to develop a Codebook as a guide to clean the raw data before analysis.
• Illustrate one method to link clean data points to a Variable sheet for storage.

Intended Audience

Public health professionals

Presenter

Christi Erwin has worked in public health for over 30 years. For the last 10 years, she has worked in public health evaluation, developing data collection tools, designing databases and automating data reports. Christi has a bachelor’s degree in Biological Sciences/Biomedical Sciences and a master’s degree in Healthcare Administration from Oklahoma State University.