<p>Everything regarding race is so controversial and I don’t mean to open a can of worms but I’m just wondering… How far back (generations) do you go and what % would you include? </p>
<p>For example, if you were 1/8 or 1/4 something, would you include it? Does it matter what that something is? (For example, would you include 1/8 black but not 1/8 Hispanic?) </p>
<p>And what would you tell a person who has more than one heritage along the same line? For example, the child of Nicaraguans (or Colombians, or Argentines, or Mexicans) whose grandparents were Spaniards. Would that person check Hispanic ‘Mexican’ and Hispanic "Spaniard’? They could do that if they are Puerto Rican, Cuban or Mexican but not from anywhere else. </p>
<p>My husband is partially Native American…he has blond hair…soooo, race is really what you call yourself…he is officially “white” as far as he is concerned…and no one else would ever know.</p>
<p>I just filled out our census card today, and I was surprised that it didn’t have a way to say you’re of mixed background. My husband is from Spain, so that was easy; they had a category for it. But for our kid, I wanted to say half and half and there was no way to do that. It seems old-fashioned to insist that everyone has just one cultural identity or ethnic heritage. It seems to me that this will mess up their data; we’ll all choose something, but we may not be using the same criteria.</p>
<p>tobe - They ask two separate questions about race and heritage.</p>
<p>I could be wrong but I don’t think they’re assuming everyone has one race because they are allowing people to check more than one. So I would think for your kids, they would expect you to check ‘yes’ for Hispanic (they make a point to include Spaniards) and "Spaniard’ on the line. Then, for race, they would expect you to check white if both you and your husband are white, or white and whatever race you are. </p>
<p>These are exactly the problems I am having. It is hard to choose for myself and really hard for the kids.</p>
<p>Did anyone else think the first two questions had a problem? Question 1 ask how many people are in the household and says to include EVERYONE. They spend a lot of page space telling you who “everyone” is. Then…question 2 asks if you have other people in the household, and lists exactly some of the same categories that it said TO INCLUDE on question 1.</p>
<p>You can pick more than one box for race- I would go with whatever race you identify your kids with in the school district for example.
If you are mixed, then put the races with which you identify.</p>
<p>For living in your home- they make very clear it is only the people actually sleeping in your home on April 1st. ( much like with FAFSA- you include your assets on the day you fill it out- not two weeks from now).</p>
<p>emeraldkity, The kids are 7/16 one race, 7/16 another race and 1/8 another race. (That doesn’t include Hispanic.) They are identified as all at school but I often see school papers come home in all sorts of permutations. (For example, the computer did not identify my kid as eligible for a scholarship even though that race is obvious. Another problem I have is that we keep getting school announcements in a foreign language because the school has us checked off as that group.) </p>
<p>I am 1/8 something that no one would guess.</p>
<p>I don’t think you need to specify which percent- but I would put each race down- especially since they are identified as such at school.</p>
<p>If you are 1/8 something that is part of your culture, then put it down.
Native American for instance- some tribes allow you to be even less than that I think to be a registered member- and if you are, then put it down.</p>
<p>Im not going to fill it out till April 1st, cause with my family * who knows* who will be here.</p>
<p>This isn’t totally on topic, but is it a new practice to NOT count college students away at college as part of the parent’s household? How will they be counted? Do the colleges/universities provide the information to the Census Bureau? If so, then they are not going to get accurate racial information, because more and more students do not disclose their race to their college.</p>
<p>Or, if the students themselves have to fill out Census forms, I hope they have employed a lot of Census workers in college towns to track down and chase down the students who may not place a high priority on filling out a government form. </p>
<p>Is this the first time that parents can’t include children away at college as members of their household on Census forms?</p>
<p>but is it a new practice to NOT count college students away at college as part of the parent’s household? How will they be counted? Do the colleges/universities provide the information to the Census Bureau?</p>
<p>I imagine that if we don’t count them when they are away at school, then yes- if they are at school that info will be given.
I don’t remember how it was last time- wasn’t it in 2000?</p>
<p>I’ll have to ask my son how they’re handling it at his school. Because that’s where he’ll be on April 1. So even though he’s a legal resident of New Jersey, votes in New Jersey, would pay New Jersey taxes if he made enough money to have to pay them, and so on, he’ll be counted towards Chicago’s population in determining Congressional representation, etc.? I don’t get it.</p>
<p>The 8 kids sharing my S’s college rental don’t even bother to go to the mailbox. Good luck getting any of them to fill this out. Maybe they should have texted it…</p>
<p>The form asked my race but did not give as a choice “Caucasian”. It offered “white” instead. White is a color not a race. I checked “other” and wrote in the explanation “Black Irish” as opposed to Lace Irish. Think they’ll get it?</p>
<p>My D has been getting emails from her school reminding her that she will be getting a form and she needs to fill it out. I’m not sure how it works in dorms - do they have one form that has to make the rounds of the entire building? Or per room? Or something special specifically for that sort of situation (or hospitals, prisons, etc).</p>
<p>S seldom checks his apt mail - most stuff comes to his school mailbox, because the stuff gets stolen out of his regular mailbox.</p>
<p>I do a lot of genealogy, and use the old censuses quite often. It wasn’t unusual for people to get counted twice. My great-grandfather’s sister is counted in Iowa, where she lived with her parents, and in St. Louis, where she was away visiting relatives. There was also a problem with those handwritten censuses being done over a period of time - so people who moved during that time might get counted twice - or not at all.</p>
<p>Some of my fellow genealogists are upset because there is talk to destroy these censuses after being tallied. In the past, they’ve been archived, then released to the public after a certain number of years (72 years, the current one says.)</p>
<p>Ah but aren’t these just all arbitrary simplified categories that only work because they have social and cultural meaning to people, not a scientific basis per se? Caucasion isn’t any more scientifically valid or meaningful than the word white (but we both know what social grouping they reflect).</p>
<p>I am glad this year people have the option of checking more than one box, instead of having to choose one race or the other. So much of the country is bi or multi-racial. Not to mention multi ethnic.</p>
<p>Why does the government want to know if I am Samoan or Spanish, but not Portuguese or Arabic? Goofy, goofy system.</p>
<p>Deja, when I was in school in 1970 in Italy, we were counted there as students living abroad. So this isn’t new. I asked my daughter if she knew she was going to have to fill out a census form (living at school) and she hadn’t seen anything yet.</p>
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