Appendix C: Interactive Map Data Description

Human Development Index (HDI)1

HDI calculations can be found from the Social Science Research Council’s Measure of America: Portrait of Los Angeles County (2018). The Human Development Index (HDI) is a summary measure of average achievement in key dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, being knowledgeable and have a decent standard of living. The HDI is the geometric mean of normalized indices for each of the three dimensions.

The health dimension is assessed by life expectancy at birth, the education dimension is measured by mean of years of schooling for adults aged 25 years and more and expected years of schooling for children of school entering age. The standard of living dimension is measured by gross national income per capita. The HDI uses the logarithm of income, to reflect the diminishing importance of income with increasing GNI. The scores for the three HDI dimension indices are then aggregated into a composite index using geometric mean. Refer to Technical notes for more details.
The HDI simplifies and captures only part of what human development entails. It does not reflect on inequalities, poverty, human security, empowerment, etc.

Enviroscan2

CalEnviroScreen 3.0 uses 20 indicators covering pollution burden and population characteristics of California’s approximately 8,000 census tracts taken from the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment’s (OEHHA). The CalEnviroScreen map used for the pollution burden scores uses percentiles to assign scores for health indicators in a given geographic area. Higher percentile scores indicate a higher pollution burden for that location with Los Angeles county being the measure at 100. Furthermore, the pollution burden score is made up of two components – Exposures and Environmental Effects. The numbers represented on the graph are only one number of the few for the locations surrounding the districts and can be further explored in the CalEnviroScreen 3.0 map which can be used to specify a pollution burden around a specific school. The indicators are organized in four domains including:

Domain

Variable

Exposure Indicators

Air Quality- Ozone

Exposure Indicators

Air Quality Particulate Matter (PM)

Exposure Indicators

Diesel Particulate Matter

Exposure Indicators

Drinking Water Contaminants

Exposure Indicators

Pesticide Use

Exposure Indicators

Toxic Releases from Facilities

Exposure Indicators

Traffic Density

Environmental Effects Indicators

Clean-up Sites

Environmental Effects Indicators

Groundwater Threats

Environmental Effects Indicators

Hazardous Waste Generators and Facilities

Environmental Effects Indicators

Impaired Waters

Environmental Effects Indicators

Solid Waste Sites and Facilities

Environmental Effects Indicators

Clean-up Sites

Environmental Effects Indicators

Groundwater Threats

Sensitive Population

Age:  Children and Elderly

Sensitive Population

Asthma

Sensitive Population

Cardiovascular Disease: Heart Attack Rate

Sensitive Population

Low-Birth Weight Infants

Socioeconomic Factors

Educational Attainment

Socioeconomic Factors

Linguistic Isolation

Socioeconomic Factors

Poverty

Socioeconomic Factors

Unemployment

Socioeconomic Factors

Housing Burdened Low-Income Neighborhoods

Socioeconomic Factors

Cardiovascular Disease: Heart Attack Rate

Note: Scores for each category are first calculated by averaging their indicators’ percentiles. Pollution Burden is then calculated as the average of Exposures and half-weighted Environmental Effects; Population Characteristics is calculated as the average of Sensitive Population and Socioeconomic Factors. Overall CalEnviro Screen scores are still calculated as the product of Pollution Burden and Population Characteristics scores.

UC/CSU Readiness3

To be considered for admission to the University of California (UC) or the California State University (CSU) system, high school students must complete all a–g courses with grades of C or higher. The a–g course sequence includes 30 semesters of UC-approved college preparatory coursework in seven subject areas, and completion indicates a high level of academic preparation. School districts must submit local coursework to the UC to obtain a–g designation, and in some subject areas (history/social studies, mathematics, and world languages), the course requirements are quite specific. The a–g course requirements are considerably more rigorous than the minimum requirements set by the state of California for a high school diploma.

Comprehensive School Improvement

CSI schools are Title I schools identified as low-performing by the state. Two subcategories of eligibility for schools within Comprehensive School Improvement (CSI):

  • CSI-Low Graduation Rate Schools  Non-Title I and Title I high schools with a graduation rate less than 67% averaged over two years
  • CSI-Lowest Performing Schools  Lowest performing 5% of Title I schools criteria based on meeting one of the following performance level color combinations on Dashboard State Indicators for “All” students:
    • All red indicators
    • All red but one indicator of any other color
    • All red and orange indicators
    • Five or more indicators where the majority are red

References:

  1. More information on Human Development Index (HDI) history. application and methodology can be found at http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human-development-index-hdi
  2. More information on Enviroscan methodology can be found at https://oehha.ca.gov/media/downloads/calenviroscreen/document/ces3newinces3.pdf
  3. More information on A-G requirements and UC/CSU readiness can be found at Betts, J. R., Zau, A. C., & Bachofer, K. V. (2013). College Readiness as a Graduation Requirement. San Francisco, CA: Public Policy Institute of California.