Hello Chad,
Thank you for posting this question, especially as I imagine quite a number of those who wish to use CODAP with real data find themselves in similar situations.
One very incidental help is an improvement to your formula for HOURS. I suggest “HOURS=split(Start_Time, “:”, 1)” which will grab the first item in a list delimited by the colon.
As you may know, you can create a CODAP “plugin” that massages the data. You can learn about these in this Getting Started Guide. But, of course, you have to know a bit of JavaScript to create a plugin.
Another approach might be to automate the preparation of the data using something like Excel Macros. If you aren’t able to do this yourself, perhaps you can find a spreadsheet guru who could whip something up. I think the end result would allow students to quickly transform their csv into something ready to drop in and use in CODAP.
Bill