Stop Linked Records from creating duplicates in table

[Emma_Roeder]

Hi,
I’m in the process of setting up my database. I have one table with student information, and one table with volunteer information. In the volunteer table I assumed I would be able to paste in my list of students, then convert it to a linked field, and have it link to the student table. When I do so, instead of linking to the actual student records, it just creates a whole new set of records in the student table that are blank, except for the student name. How do I link them without having to type all 500 student names individually?

[Justin_Barrett]

When I try what you describe, the links are made correctly. Could you describe step-by-step what you’re doing? There may be some detail that’s missing from your initial post.

[Emma_Roeder]

So there are two tables, Student Demographics, and Teacher Demographics. The key field for the students is Student name, and the key field for the teachers is Teacher name.
The student table has a column for the teacher’s names, and the teacher table has one for the student’s names. I started by pasting in all the data from our spreadsheets, with both name columns set to single line text. Once all the data was in both tables, I tried to switch the Teacher Name and Student Name columns to linked fields. When I did so, it didn’t link to the actual records, it just created additional records in the linked table that were blank except for the student name.
I can link the records if I type in every name one by one, but I have 500 students and 500 teachers, so that seems like way too much work.

[Mike_McLaughlin]

Ok, so you should only need to switch 1 of the fields in a table to a linked field, the twin field will be auto-created in the other table(as illustrated below).

Let me know if I overlooked something.

To start, I created these 2 tables:

Then I changed the teacher field in the Students table to a linked field to the Teachers table, and this is what I get:

Note: I did not create the ‘Students’ field in the teacher table, that was automatic when I changed the ‘Teachers’ field in the other table to a linked field