Initial OMB Request Memo

Generic Information Collection Request: Survey of Group Quarters Administrators to Inform Plans for an Internet Self-Response Instrument for Group Quarters residents in the 2030 Census.

Request: The Census Bureau plans to conduct additional research under the field test clearance (OMB number 0607-0971). We plan to conduct a survey of administrators of group quarters to inform the development and deployment of a new method of enumerating group quarters residents for the 2030 Census. Group quarters (GQs) are places where people live or stay in a group living arrangement and which are owned or managed by an entity or organization that provides housing and may also provide services to its residents or clients. GQs include places like student and worker housing, group homes, residential treatment centers, etc. Group Quarters is a decennial census operation that specializes in enumerating residents of group quarters and offers various electronic, paper-based, and interviewer-administered options.

The current plans for enumerating GQ residents in the 2030 Census include the development of an option to allow residents to complete the decennial census questionnaire via a secure Census Bureau online questionnaire (also known as Internet Self-Response or ISR). GQ residents will receive email invitations and reminders to complete the online census questionnaire. The emails will contain a link to the ISR instrument. GQ administrators will be required to coordinate the ISR option with their residents either by providing email addresses for their residents or by distributing emails with the links to the ISR themselves.

To determine the suitability of using an internet self-response (ISR) questionnaire in various types of GQs, we plan ask GQ administrators whether an internet mode and email notifications to residents will work for them. We will conduct an online survey administered in Qualtrics to obtain feedback from GQ administrators. As a part of this current submission, we are seeking approval for this survey and for nine pretesting interviews conducted by Census Bureau staff to refine the survey questionnaire before fielding it.

Purpose: The purpose of the survey is to determine whether the ISR option should be made available for various types of GQs. The survey will ask administrators about residents’ use of email and access to the internet, GQ staff’s ability to coordinate the ISR option with residents, and other topics.

Population of Interest: Census Bureau subject matter experts selected the GQ types they thought would contain residents who could self-respond using on online questionnaire. The plan is to survey all those GQ types. The survey will be sent to administrators of the following GQ types:

• Residential Schools for People with Disabilities

• College/University Student Housing

• Group Homes Intended for Adults

• Residential Treatment Centers for Adults

• Workers’ Group Living Quarters and Job Corps Centers

• Religious Group Quarters

Timeline: We plan to pretest the questionnaire in April 2023 and conduct the survey in May through July 2023.

Language: The survey will be in English only.

Survey Administration: Respondents will receive up to 4 emails containing a link to an online questionnaire programmed in Qualtrics. Once the participant answers the survey, no more emails will be sent to them. The survey field period will be 3 weeks in length, with 2 emails sent the first week and then 1 email each additional week.

Sample: We will conduct the survey with a convenience sample of GQ administrators for in-scope GQ types who provided email addresses during the 2020 Census. To maximize the likelihood of obtaining adequate numbers of responses from each GQ type, our sample will include all GQ administrators with email addresses for the GQ types of interest. The in-scope GQ types and their sample sizes are listed in Table 1 below.

Table 1: GQ types and sample size for the online survey

In-scope GQ type	Sample size
Residential Schools for People with Disabilities	9
College/University Student Housing	928
Group Homes Intended for Adults (noncorrectional)	588
Residential Treatment Centers for Adults (noncorrectional)	191
Workers’ Group Living Quarters and Job Corps Centers	178
Religious Group Quarters	186
Total	2080

Pretesting Recruitment: Potential pretesting participants will be identified by external stakeholders who advise the Census Bureau Group Quarters operation. We will contact potential pretesting participants by telephone and ask them to participate in a virtual session during which they will complete the questionnaire and provide oral feedback. They will be informed that their participation is voluntary and that the information they provide will be confidential.

Survey Recruitment: The sample of potential survey respondents will be contacted via email. They will be informed that the results of the survey will be used to inform the Census Bureau’s plans for the next census, that their participation in the survey is voluntary and that their responses will be confidential. Enclosure 1 contains the text for the four emails.

Pretesting Protocol: We will ask participants to complete the online questionnaire and to describe what they are thinking (think-aloud procedure) as they navigate the survey and answer the questions. Upon completion of the survey, we will ask follow-up questions about specific aspects of the questionnaire and any additional issues identified during the think-aloud. The pretesting protocol is included as Enclosure 2.

Questionnaire: The survey questionnaire is included as Enclosure 3. If changes are made after pretesting, an addendum will be sent with the final questionnaire before it is fielded.

Informed Consent: Pretesting participants and survey respondents will be informed that their participation is voluntary and that the information they provide will be confidential.

Incentive: Participants will not be provided an incentive for their participation in the survey or the pretesting interviews.

Burden hours: We estimate that recruiting telephone calls to find pretesting participants will take up to 3 minutes each, and that we will need to contact three GQ administrators for each completed pretesting interview. Thus, to obtain a pretesting sample of 9 participants, we will need to contact up to 27 GQ administrators.

We estimate that the survey will take up to 5 minutes to complete. We assume a maximum overall response rate of 15% for our survey.

The burden associated with specific tasks is summarized in Table 2. We estimate the total burden for this study to be 40.8 hours.

Table 2: Description of burden hours by task

	Number of participants	Participation time	Total burden hours
Recruiting calls for pretest	27	3	81 min
Pretest interviews	9	45	405 min
Read 4 survey emails	2080	5	400 min
Answer survey	312	5	1,560 min
Total burden			2,446 min or 40.8 hours

The materials to be used in the current study are listed below:

Enclosure 1: Email invitation and reminders

Enclosure 2: Pretesting protocol

Enclosure 3: ISR Suitability Survey Questionnaire

The contact person for questions regarding data collection and statistical aspects of the design of this research is listed below:

Alexandra Piccirillo

Center for Behavioral Science Methods

U.S. Census Bureau

Washington, D.C. 20233

(301) 763-2360

Alexandra.a.piccirillo@census.gov

4