Census Work

[Tammy Hope]

Dual purpose thread.

1. For those of you out of work and needing income, contact the U.S. Census Department at Censusjobs2010.gov

It's temporary work but it's something, and passing the test is a snap.

2. this one is more about advice. I took the test last December and passed it, and worked as an enumerator from early April until Mid-may of this year, while presenting as a male and "getting away with" as much female clothing as was practical.

Possibly relevant and possibly not anecdote - the woman who was my team leader was a 22 year old refugee from a finance company (god only knows how out of the available choices they thought SHE was the logical choice as team leader) who just so happened to be the daughter in law of the fundie preacher who married my wife and I.


she's a snobby _itch in any case and being a member of his church just corrupts it further, she and I were cool towards each other but towards the end of the assignment, Preacher Man saw me at the supermarket one day at the end of a shift and complained to her that my (woman's, though he didn't know it at the time) shorts were too short for a representative of these here United States - which led to her calling her super and telling him she was getting complaints about some of her people's attire (the one complainer being her father in law but she didn't report that) which in turn led to new rules for dress.

Now, laying aside whether or not my patched together wardrobe was sufficiently professional, I'm uncertain whether or not her report was specific to me in such a way that there might be a black mark on my record, but i wasn't fired.

Now, with that background out of the way, here's the point-

I've gone full time now and I wish to work as Laura (other than in those paperwork matters in which they must use my legal name).

My presumption is that a Federal job should be the easiest place to find a tolerance of my situation - am I correct in this assumption?

does anyone else here have any experience in presenting "cross gender" in a temporary or permanent federal job?

[Arch]

I was thinking of looking into this, until I read the following: "If you are a male applicant born after 12/31/59, you must confirm that you are registered with the Selective Service System."

I've been so busy that I haven't applied for my SS exemption. And I don't want to out myself to the Census people. Crap.

Oh, well, I don't know what kind of job they would give me, and I have no desire for a job that requires lots of public contact. I did that way back in the day and hated it.

Sorry, Laura, I have no advice!

[Tammy Hope]

I don't know what this round will be like.

Last spring we were doing address marking and the rule was we were supposed to knock on the door and explain ourselves if anyone answered.

So yeah, if you did it by the book you would have a certain amount of public contact.

If anyone looks it up and sees the rate of pay (in our area it's $10.50/hr. but my understanding is it has something to do with the local economy and isn't the same everywhere) and thinks "that's not much" let e just mention that they pay generously for mileage. Most weeks I worked 40 hours and could pretty much double my hourly pay on mileage.

[Arch]

I think my friend was making considerably more than ten and a half, but I would have to ask him. We live in an expensive area.

Why on earth should you bang on the door and talk to someone at every single address? That seems gratuitous. Did they explain why? But I could handle that. Maybe I should get this Selective Service thing taken care of as soon as I file final grades. I really need the work...

[Tammy Hope]

I thought so to...and I won';t state on-line what I did about that since you never know what will get read by whom.

but the idea was that you don't want to spook people. For just one example, it's considered bad form to let Hispanics think you are INS (or whatever INS is called now)

We had a little privacy statement thing that was English on one side and Spanish on the other which explained that we couldn't use anything we learned for any other purpose (because if we found someone home we had a short list of questions we were supposed to ask - about whether there was another living quarter on the property and such)

the told us in training that if we knocked on a door and found 5 terrorists sitting in their building bombs we couldn't legally say anything to any other government agency about it.

By law nothing the census learns on a visit is supposed to be shared with other agencies (not saying I believe that but it's what we're supposed to believe as enumerators).

[myles]

How interesting. I was thinking about applying for this. Here is where I stopped: I am a veteran and it asks for you to provide your DD214. Well mine is in my female name and has "homosexuality" written on it (long story). I decided not to pursue it along with the fact I am going back to school and am not sure why I am working at all. (I am asked this question a lot) In the end I guess I just want to do something for a few hours a week, even if it is lift stuff. Anyway since I do not want to present my DD214 and was not sure how the whole trans thing would work I dropped it. They were hiring locally for a 2 year gig (that is what I was going to go for) as an office manager of some kind. Laura let me know how it goes. The pay is based on where you live/work some areas S.Fran pay more than others, middle of no where Cali, based on local minimum wages and economies.
Andrew/Myles

[Janet_Girl]

Too cold out for me. 24⁰ outside and it never got about 32⁰ today.



Hugs and Love
Janet

[myles]

Of course the weather is also a major factor, but I think it doesn't start for a while here. And that just gives you a reason to go buy yourself a nice winter outfit.
Cheers, (with a nice hot drink!)
Myles

[Tammy Hope]

Too cold out for me. 24⁰ outside and it never got about 32⁰ today.



Hugs and Love
Janet

The actual work won't start for some time yet. they are not even doing the call-backs for another month. The "phase" that is being hired for are the follow-up visits for people who don't send back there surveys and the surveys don't go out until....March?

so the jobs likely won't start until April.

[LordKAT]

always wondered about those as I've never received one, guess i was never counted.

[Autumn]

The pay where I am is $13ish. The pay 30 miles away in a major city is over $17.

Course I don't want to walk around downtown in one of the largest cities in the country knocking on doors.