We often think of black history in terms of past achievements by exceptional individuals.

If you wanted a broad general snapshot of most African American people today, the trends in their neighborhoods, and the factors that will influence the emerging black leaders of tomorrow, where would you turn?

A new website has created an extremely easy way to discover information about racial and ethnic groups in the USA by using census data gathered by the U.S. government.

According to the creators, "Diversity Data is an online tool for exploring quality of life data across different metropolitan areas, for people of different racial/ethnic groups in the United States.”

Diversity Data “provides values and rankings for the largest U.S. metropolitan areas on different indicators in 8 areas of life (domains), including demographics, education, economic opportunity, housing, neighborhoods, and health."

Just pick a state, select a metropolitan area, then instantly observe what the trends reveal.

By using an option called "customize profile," you can dissect and analyze the information in more ways than you could ever imagine.

Each state can be searched by selecting from the largest counties.

The brainchild of this fantastic free tool is the Harvard School of Public Health.

I highly recommend Diversity Data for:

• Population Demographics and Diversity
• Health
• Housing Opportunities
• Economic Opportunities
• Education
• Residential Integration and Neighborhood Characteristics
• Crime
• Physical Environment

Where are the rural or urban centers in the USA where different racial and ethnic groups are striding ahead? You'll discover the answer to this question and a lot more by digging into Diversity Data online.

The trends reflect possible history in the making. If you spot differences in your state that are surprising, let the information challenge you to think about some ways you might influence your community’s destiny.