U.S. Census

I started my Census job on April 27. I along with about 20 other people in my group met for 4 days for training. The training went through all the things we could and probably would come across while out in the field. It was very informative and I never thought there would be so many different circumstances that could arise filling out a census form. Luckily for me Jon spends a lot of his time working from home. He took over while I was in training from 8 am-5 pm. He made sure the last 2 kids got on the bus and took Hayden to preschool. He also made sure the kids did their homework and had dinner ready when I got home. It was really nice and I felt like I was on vacation.
My job consisted of going to peoples houses that were on my list and fill out a census form for them. I heard some horror stories and we also talked about difficult people, but luckily I didn't run into any mean people. I had a great experience. Yes, I did have a couple people say they wouldn't fill it out, but I was at least able to get how many people were living in that household on April 1, 2010 (census day). Sure the census would love names, ages, race, but there main goal is the number of people living in that house on Census day.

There was enough work for our area for 7 weeks. They figured between 6-9 weeks. Which worked out excellent for me because we were leaving for Disney just a few days later. I mainly worked while the kids were in school and maybe an hour in the evening and then about 8 hours on Saturday. A few days into working the kids started complaining about me working and wanted me to stay home with them. The funny thing is when I am home they mostly ignore me and don't even recognize me being home. Whatever!!

Too bad there isn't a job like this for me to do a few time a year for a little extra bonus money. If there was I would be all over it.

Over all I had a great experience and met a lot of great people in my Census group and would love to do this again in 10 years.

The call back

Well it happened. I got a call back from the Census at the beginning of April and they offered me a Census job going to peoples homes that didn't mail their Census form back. I start training classes in a little less than a month. I am kind of excited yet a little nervous all at the same time. I haven't had a job since Brenton was born over 13 years ago. I am not counting the job I do for Jon's business doing the book keeping and bills since I can do it pretty much whenever I feel like it and I really only do it a couple hours a week and I don't really have anyone to report to in fact Jon and his partner come to me for all the things regarding money and bills.

Census 2010

Since January, I had been thinking about applying to work with the Census. So I looked up all about it on the Internet at the Census website and gave a call to the local Census office in our area to find out more. She told me my next step was to take the test. So on Saturday, February 13th, I headed over to some church not to nearby to take the test. I left, or so I thought, with plenty of time to get there since yesterday was snowy and today there was still icy patches where the shade covers the road. The on ramp to the freeway I needed to go on was blocked off due to a car crash. So I had to go back and around and take some back roads to get to the next exit up on ramp. Then my GPS told me the church was on the right and it was on the left so I had to turn around by this time I was supposed to be in my seat. So I turned around parked the car headed into the church and saw to the right a gym where people were playing basketball and then saw a sign off to the left saying Census with an arrow pointing to the left. So I ran down the hall and came to some stairs and didn't know if I should go up them or go straight there was no sign. So I walked straight and nothing so I ran up the stairs and saw a sign and got into the classroom. I was about 10 minutes late by this time and was hoping to just sneak in but there were only 4 other people besides the instructor in the room. So I signed in and took a seat and filled out some paper work that the others were working on. Luckily, I was in super speed mode and filled out all the paper work before at least two others. After the paper work, the instructor read off a bunch of stuff and then it was on to the test. I did print out the online practice test the day before and took it at home while my kids were running around along with their Tady cousins whom we were watching as part of a Christmas present we gave Christa and Aaron. We gave them a Macaroni Grill gift card and told them we would watch their kids when they go. So with all that racket I set the timer for 30 minutes and took the practice test. I think I did pretty good considering the noise and that I couldn't really concentrate. I missed 4 out of 28 questions. After we took the real test, which in some areas were easier than the practice test but others were a little more confusing at first. We had 30 minutes to answer 28 questions so just over a minute per question. She would let us know when 15 minutes were up and then when we had 5 minutes left. I had no problem completing all the question and had plenty of time to go back to the few I circled to reread and check over. Since there were only 5 people, she graded the tests right then and then gave us a sticky note with how many we got right. I only missed one question so I was pretty happy about that. I could see her while she was grading the tests so I know one other person missed one and another missed 2 and one got them all right and one missed a bunch. She said our class was the best scoring of all her classes so far.
If they call it will be in another month or 2. If I do get a job, it will most likely be calling or driving to peoples homes who didn't turn in their census forms and get them filled out all in the city where I live. It could last up to 3 months depending on how many people mailed in their forms in my area. At this point I don't really care if I get chosen or not I just thought it would be something worth trying out and make a little money on the side.