Newsletter Archive
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🚨 BREAKING: Census Comment Deadline Extended to November 2!
October 02, 2026Read MoreWhen the government proposes significant changes to federal regulations, the public needs adequate time to review the proposed changes and weigh in before new rules are finalized. That timeline is typically 60 or 90 days.Â
For the proposed decennial census rule, the initial public comment period was just 33 days, leaving insufficient time for Americans to parse the incredibly detailed proposal and its implications.
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Take Action! HEA Title II Report Cards on State Teacher Credentialing and Preparation and More
September 30, 2026by Meghan MauryRead MoreCollection of the Week: HEA Title II Report Cards on State Teacher Credentialing and Preparation. ED is revising the annual Title II reports used to collect and publish information about teacher preparation programs and state teacher credentialing systems. The reports collect information including teacher-preparation enrollment and demographics, completion rates, credentialing requirements and assessment pass rates, teacher shortages, and programs identified as low-performing. ED says the revision will remove several items it considers “no longer needed” and update reporting instructions to reflect the Department’s current organizational structure, but the notice does not identify which data elements are being eliminated.Â
Comments due October 20.Every time the government makes a change to a survey or a form — or introduces a new survey or form — you have the right to weigh in on that decision. The Take Action! newsletter highlights surveys or forms the government is changing, renewing, or introducing. Click the links to tell the government what you think about the changes they are making.
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Register for Rapid Response Data Briefing: National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) Redesign
September 23, 2026Read MoreDid you know that NCHS has proposed a redesign of the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS)?
Starting in 2027, several key topics would rotate off the survey, while some new content would rotate on. Then, beginning in 2028–2029, NCHS plans a broader redesign to shift from primarily in-person interviews to an approach using web, mail, and in-person follow-up, with a shorter, less structured questionnaire.
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Take Action! Reporting Portal for Civil Rights Violations and More
September 19, 2026by Meghan MauryRead MoreForm of the Week: Reporting Portal for Civil Rights Violations. Despite a Federal Register title incorrectly referring to this listing as the “International Terrorism Victim Expense Reimbursement Program,” in this listing DOJ is actually revising its online Portal for Reporting Civil Rights Violations. Notably, the revised portal adds Second Amendment rights as a category of civil-rights complaints, reflecting DOJ’s unusual new treatment of alleged restrictions on gun ownership and carrying as a Civil Rights Division enforcement priority.
Comments due September 25.Every time the government makes a change to a survey or a form — or introduces a new survey or form — you have the right to weigh in on that decision. The Take Action! newsletter highlights surveys or forms the government is changing, renewing, or introducing. Click the links to tell the government what you think about the changes they are making.
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Why Seemingly Arcane Process Changes to the Decennial Census Would be Catastrophic for All Americans
September 15, 2026by Meeta Anand, Beth Jarosz, and Chris DickRead MoreOn September 10, 2026 the Census Bureau posted a notice in the Federal Register titled “Decennial Census of the Population of Americans; Proposed Residence Criteria and Proposed Regulations for Demographic Questions.” Despite the stale-sounding title, this proposed rule upends nearly 250 years of history, ignores Constitutional mandates, will make life harder for all Americans, and proposes to codify all of those changes into the Code of Federal Regulations (rather than, as is traditional, Census Bureau policy).
The goal of every census is to “count everyone once, only once, and in the right place.” Not only is that catchphrase memorable, it is the outgrowth of the mandates of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution regarding apportionment. In addition to being the foundation of political representation, the population count in each decennial census is the common denominator in nearly every aspect of public life. Census counts are used for emergency preparation and disaster response. They are used to plan for schools, roads, and hospitals. They are used to track crime rates and to monitor public health. They are used to understand whether we are making progress in alleviating historic patterns of discrimination. They are used to understand employment patterns and economic opportunity. They are used by businesses to understand their workforce and customer base in order to make sound investments. These examples are just the tip of the iceberg—a comprehensive list could go on for pages (in fact the Census Bureau published a list of 50 common uses).