Chase,
Try this:
1) Save in notepad, e.g. myfile.txt:
2) Open Excel
3) Open file
4) Choose "all files (*.*)" in drop-down
5) Navigate to directory containing your .txt
6) Choose "Delimited" in the import wizard
7) Check "My data has header"
😎 Start import at row 1
9) Next
10) Choose "Tab" as delimiter
11) You can leave the text qualifier as "
12) Next
13) Click on the STATE_CODE column
14) Choose "Text" as format
15) Click on the ALUMNI_NUMBER column
16) Looks like you can leave as "General" for the format type
17) Finish
18) Verify Excel output
19) Save as .xlsx if you have Excel 2007+ installed on your GIS box, otherwise, save as .xls
20) Open ArcMap
21) Add data
22) Double click on your .xls
23) Select the worksheet
24) Add
25) Right click and confirm the attribute table
26) Download state shapefile - ftp://ftp2.census.gov/geo/tiger/TIGER2015/STATE/tl_2015_us_state.zip
27) Unzip
28) Add data in ArcMap
29) Navigate to the State shapefile - "tl_2015_us_state.shp"
30) Verify rendering in ArcMap
31) Right-click "tl_2015_us_state"
32) Joins and Relates
33) Join
34) Join attributes from a table
35) 1 - STUSPS
36) 2 - myfile$
37) STATE_CODE
38) Keep all records
39) Validate join
40) Close
41) OK
42) Right-click "tl_2015_us_state"
43) Open attribute table
44) Scroll over to the last two columns
45) Confirm Join
46) Close table
47) Right-click "tl_2015_us_state"
48) Properties
49) Symbology tab
50) Quantities
51) Graduated colors
52) Value - ALUMNI_NUMBER
53) OK
54) Review choropleth