stromcarlson.com

This week, I’ve been training as an enumerator for the 2010 U.S. Census. Essentially, this means I’m going to be knocking on doors and asking people the basic set of questions that are on the census questionnaire. It seems like it’s going to be an interesting job; if nothing else, it beats sitting around at home and waiting anxiously to hear back from all the colleges I’ve applied to this year.

When I applied way back in late January or early February, the application process included a 28 question multiple-choice test. The Census Bureau provides a practice test which, for all intents and purposes, is just as appallingly easy as the actual test. Questions include such difficult tasks as placing dates in chronological order, looking at a map and counting how many houses you’ll pass if you walk the most efficient route from one intersection to another, and determining the year of someone’s birth if they tell you their age. To be considered for employment, you must answer at least ten of the questions correctly. Ten! That’s 36%! Three months later, and I’m still not sure what to make of that.

Of course, there’s another test after the training class finishes, so not all hope is lost.

The training class is being held in an elementary school; the explanation is that the census bureau was able to borrow a few classrooms at no cost. The only problem with this arrangement is that the entire classroom full of adults is sitting in chairs and at desks designed to comfortably seat ten-year-olds. Banged knees and backaches abound. And because it’s an elementary school, there are strict rules about signing in and out, checking our IDs, and where on the campus we are allowed to go (the main hallway, our classrooms, the restrooms, and nowhere else). The elementary school principal sent out a memo reminding us that we need to be mindful of these rules “while working in and around the children.”

My coworkers are an interesting cross-section of this part of Los Angeles. There are out-of-work actors (“What happens if I need to go to a casting call?”), musicians with weird tattoos and even weirder facial hair (“Man, I never thought I’d ever be saying ‘Hi, I’m here from the government and I’d like to ask you some questions’”), substitute teachers, hipsters with no identifiable career, old people, and even a few veterans of the Census Bureau and various three-letter government agencies.

It’ll be interesting to see how this pans out, especially while working in and around the children.