Recruitment Update – community adviser jobs go live on 3 August 2020
As part of our phased approach to Census 2021 recruitment for field staff, our first vacancies to go live are for our community engagement roles. These are census engagement managers (CEMs) and community advisers (CAs).
Last month we told you about the recruitment for CEMs. The application window for these roles began on 7 July and closes on 31 July 2020. Thank you for helping to promote our CEM recruitment campaign. We have had a very good response to these jobs.
In August we begin recruiting community advisers who will work with specific communities to build trust and encourage participation in the census. The application window for these roles is 3 August until 28 August.
All information about the roles is available at www.censusjobs.co.uk. We’ve written separately to all local authorities to promote these roles. Please help us to promote them as widely as possible by directing people to the census jobs website. When advertising these temporary Community Adviser roles, please quote salary rates by the hour (from £11.22 per hour) as the hours for each of these roles vary, and contracts are short term.
As a reminder a brief description of both roles are below:
Census Engagement Managers will work with the local authority and engage with community leaders to promote the benefit of the census and gain their support for it. They will develop a partnership working plan with the local authority that will contain details of agreed activities and support for the census operation.
Community Advisers will engage with specific communities that have been identified as needing extra support and encouragement to understand the benefit of the census to encourage completion of the census questionnaire.
These roles are one of a number of ways we will work to support you and your communities including a wide reaching national publicity campaign, supporting literature, our census website, contact centre and local Census Support Centres.
Thank you in advance for helping to promote our recruitment campaign.
How to register your interest for future census jobs
Anyone who is interested in census jobs can find out about other roles and register their interest using this link: https://censusjobs.co.uk/the-roles/
They will receive an email confirmation of their registration and instructions on what to do next.
Addressing is central to the design of the 2021 Census. We’re hosting a new workshop to support local authorities to work with ONS on addressing.
This session will provide an overview of the preparation work that has taken place to develop an address frame which ONS will use to make initial contact with both households and communal establishments.
This includes how we use Addressbase and the work undertaken to understand its application for census (including clerical address checking), the steps we take to supplement the frame for some types of communal establishment (such as student halls and care homes) and how we are ensuring that the frame is as up-to-date as possible ahead of March 2021.
We will also be providing an overview of how addressing will work during live operations to ensure that all address types are accurately captured.
This workshop will be useful to anyone interested in addressing, including your address custodians - places are limited so don’t delay, book today! Contact 2021Census.LA.Liaison@ons.gov.uk
Local Authority Regional Workshops – Update
Following our series of interactive online workshops, held between April and June, we put together a selection of the most commonly asked questions and shared these on 23 July. If you didn’t receive these please let us know.
The primary school programme, Let’s Count!, has been developed to teach pupils about the importance of the census. After the success of the programme during the 2019 census rehearsal, we have been improving the content to create an even stronger set of activities to engage pupils with this cross-curricular initiative.
We are delighted to announce that two new lesson plans will be added to strengthen the programme and teach pupils about statistics in a real-life context that reflects the current world. An NHS lesson plan has been added to champion the service and explore how census data plays a vital role in planning and funding for organisations like this. Additionally, an equality and representation lesson plan has been added to the programme to highlight the importance of inclusivity within census and everyday life.
Let’s Count! will be rolled out in 2021 across England and Wales, with school recruitment starting in September 2020.
A secondary school programme is also currently in development. We are working closely with teachers and students alike across England and Wales to develop a programme that will engage and excite students about census. The aim of the programme is to engage young people with the importance of the census and the impact it has on communities. The programme will launch in October 2020.
After publishing our approach and processes for assuring the quality of the 2021 Census data in January 2020, the Quality Assurance of Census team at ONS are working to build your trust in census estimates. We want you to trust the numbers and be confident in their use.
To help us develop the best possible understanding of each local authority (LA) population, we have been working with a small group of LAs who we feel are representative of those across England and Wales. We would now like to give you all the opportunity to get involved by answering our 5 key questions:
- When the census estimates are published, what checks will you undertake to ensure the data are as expected?
- What alternative data sources will you use to check the estimates?
- What can we do to give you confidence that we’ve undertaken a thorough quality assurance and validation of the data?
- What are your concerns? What address issues are you concerned about?
- Any other concerns linked to the quality of the estimates?
If you’d like to get involved, please send your responses to census.quality.assurance@ons.gov.uk.
We will be publishing a report later this year summarising the work we’ve been doing over the last few months. Keep a look out for news about Census 2021 quality here!
ONS is the country’s largest producer of statistics. The information we collect helps build a picture of life in the UK today and provide statistics that inform decisions made by central and local government. That work continues alongside our preparations for Census 2021, and we need your help to promote and encourage participation.
We have been incredibly busy over the last few months reacting to the coronavirus pandemic and working flexibly to overcome new challenges! With a field force of 700 interviewers whose day job is to carry out face-to-face interviews, they have adapted data collection methods in order to continue our household studies. They stopped interviewing face-to-face in mid-March and have moved their studies to telephone or online.
Our studies gather information from people, families and households. They take place all year round and won’t be stopping for census! The largest household study gathers information on employment, unemployment and reasons why people are neither working nor looking for work. We have added questions about the impact of COVID-19 on people’s employment and working patterns.
The ONS is also jointly leading a major new government study to track the presence of COVID-19 in the population. The household study will improve understanding of the current rate of infection and how many people are likely to have developed antibodies to the virus. Read more about the COVID-19 Infection Study
Earlier this year we launched a new Twitter channel @ONSfocus which we are continuing to use to keep everyone updated on our work. If you haven’t already – please follow us! We recently tweeted a short animation explaining why taking part in our studies is so important, please have a look and share on your website or with your residents.
We are continuing to work with local authorities on promotional materials to raise awareness and encourage participation in ONS studies. We’re still keen to think about how else we can inform and engage with you, particularly in these unprecedented times, and welcome knowing how you think we can help you. Please get in touch by email: SORmaterials_jobshare@ons.gov.uk
Over the last few months, ONS has been contacting local authorities about our Council Tax project. ONS is asking local authorities to send a monthly supply of Council Tax data to produce lots of types of statistics and, crucially, to prepare for and subsequently quality assure the 2021 Census.
An accurate census has many benefits for local authorities. It can be used for the planning and development of public health services and social care, library services, waste collection and transport services. Council Tax data, specifically, will help improve the accuracy of census data that are used to assess local housing needs and to measure housing affordability, as well as giving population estimates. It is important that these data are accurate, and this can only be done by quality assuring the 2021 census with Council Tax data.
With the 2021 Census fast approaching, supplying ONS with Council Tax data is now high priority. If your authority has not yet agreed to share Council Tax, please contact us at council.tax@ons.gov.uk to find out more. Working together, we can ensure Census 2021 is a huge success.
Check that your Council is talking to ONS about supplying Council Tax data.
Council Tax data is a key element of Census 2021. Supplying ONS with Council Tax data is now high priority.
- Issue One - September 2019 – featuring how we will work together and testing processes for the 2019 Rehearsal
- Issue Two - February 2020 – featuring the timeline of census activities and preparing for the 2020 workshops
- Issue Three - March 2020 – featuring the 9 strands of partnership working with local authorities and an update on addressing.
- Issue Four - April 2020 – featuring regional workshops to prepare you for census
- Issue Five – May 2020 - recruitment update – census engagement managers and community advisers
- Issue Six – June 2020 – featuring an update on addressing, Council Tax, and census jobs
Recruitment: Census Jobs
Quality: ONS’s approach and processes for assuring the quality of 2021 Census data
Census 2021 Website: www.census.gov.uk
Census 2021 Questionnaire: paper questionnaires are now available to view online
Trout, Catfish and Roach - The beginner's guide to census population estimates
Census Order and Regulations for England and Wales:
Census (England and Wales) Order 2020.
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