[Federal Register Volume 77, Number 184 (Friday, September 21, 2012)]
[Notices]
[Pages 58511-58512]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2012-23333]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Bureau of the Census

[Docket Number: 120717245-2245-01]


Announcement of Competition Under the America COMPETES 
Reauthorization Act of 2011

AGENCY: Bureau of the Census, Commerce.

ACTION: Notice of competition announcement.

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SUMMARY: The Census Bureau announces a prize competition under Section 
105 of the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2011, Public Law 
111-358 (2011) to create a statistical model to predict the census mail 
return rate of small area geographic units based on their demographic 
characteristics. The SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this notice 
provides more detailed information about the competition.

DATES: Competition began on August 31, 2012, and ends on November 1, 
2012.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION: Please visit www.kaggle.com for further 
information on the competition and eligibility. All questions regarding 
the competition may be sent to: 
[email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Census Bureau announces a prize 
competition under Section 105 of the America COMPETES Reauthorization 
Act of 2011, Public Law 111-358 (2011) to create a statistical model to 
predict the census mail return rate of small area geographic units 
based on their demographic characteristics. Census and survey 
participation rates vary considerably across geographic areas. For 
example, 2010 Census mail-form return rates varied across states from a 
high of 82 percent to a low of 65 percent. The causes of these 
differences in participation rates are many, but these causes have been 
found to be related to population and housing characteristics. 
Subpopulations may differ in their lifestyles and their attitudes 
toward census participation, and Census planners need to develop 
appropriate strategies to contact and gain respondent cooperation for 
timely and efficient data collection.
    This competition is intended to develop a statistical model to 
predict census mail return rates at the Census block group level of 
geography. The Census Bureau will use this model for planning purposes 
for the decennial census and for demographic sample surveys. The model-
based estimates of predicted mail return will be publicly released in a 
later version of the Census ``planning database'' containing updated 
demographic data.
    The Census Bureau announced this competition on their public Web 
site on August 31, 2012. This notice is intended to formally announce 
the competition in the Federal Register.

Competition Details

    Subject of the competition. The objective of this competition is to 
create the best statistical model to predict census mail return rates 
of block group areas using the demographic variables in the Census 
planning database, a file of selected variables from the 2010 Census 
and 5-year American Community Survey (ACS) estimates.
    Participants are encouraged to develop and evaluate different 
statistical approaches to propose the best predictive model for 
geographic units. The intent is to improve our current predictive 
analytics.
    The challenge will be hosted at www.kaggle.com (``Web site''), an 
online platform for predictive modeling competitions.
    Amount of the prize. The total prize amount to be awarded through 
this competition is $25,000.

Competition Rules

    (1) Basis on which the winner will be selected. The winner(s) of 
this competition will be the entrant(s) who submits the statistical 
model that is judged by a panel of experts external to the Census 
Bureau to be the best predictive model of census mail return rate at 
the block group level of geography, in accordance with Judge and 
Judging Procedures.
    (a) The 2010 Census mail form return rate will be used as the 
dependent measure in the model. Units of analysis are census block 
groups as defined by Census.
    (b) The Census Return Rate Predictive Model is to be developed from 
the variables in our newly updated planning database, which includes 
selected 2010 Census and ACS 5-year estimates of characteristics that 
Census experience and the survey literature have found to be associated 
with enumeration difficulty.
    (c) Participants can propose inclusion of additional variables not 
on the planning database as long as they meet the following criteria:
    (i) Administrative data, such as school enrollment or other 
compiled data, publically available at no cost, and
    (ii) The data are not proprietary information, such as commercial 
telephone and household characteristics lists, which require purchase 
from a vendor.
    Participants are encouraged to notify the Census Bureau of 
additional data sources to be used before completion of the model to 
assure compliance with the criteria.
    (d) The models will be evaluated as outlined in the Judge and 
Judging Procedures. Please refer to the Web site for additional 
details.
    (e) Entry materials will include the model documentation, including 
the prediction equation, a description of the methodology used to 
create the prediction equation, and algorithm/code (e.g., R/Matlab/
Python/SAS/etc.) to create the prediction equation. The documentation 
will provide a thorough understanding of the methods, and allow for 
replication in the future.
    (2) To participate in this competition, contestants must:
    (a) Enter the competition through www.Kaggle.com, the host of the 
competition submission process;
    (b) Agree to all terms of Kaggle.com;
    (c) Participants may be individuals or teams. For purposes of this 
Notice, ``Entrant'' or ``Entrants'' refers to individual participants 
and each individual participating as a member of a team.
    (3) To be eligible to win a prize under this competition, an 
individual or entity:
    (a) Must have agreed to the rules of this competition;
    (b) Are either (a) in the case of an entity, incorporated in and 
maintain a primary place of business in the United States, or (b) in 
the case of an individual, a citizen or permanent resident of the 
United States who are 18 years or older;
    (c) Must not be a Federal entity or Federal employee acting within 
the scope of employment;
    (d) Must assume risks, agree to indemnify, and waive claims against 
the

[[Page 58512]]

Federal government and its related entities; and
    (e) Anyone whose job duties or official work capacity are closely 
related to the statistical model that is the subject of the competition 
is not eligible.
    (4) Procedure for obtaining additional information:
    (a) The Census Bureau will monitor questions or discussion posted 
on the Kaggle.com competition site.
    (b) Entrants may also direct questions to 
[email protected].
    (5) Judge and Judging Procedures.
    (a) Until the last day of the competition, Entrants' scores and 
ranks on the Public Leaderboard on the Kaggle Web site will be 
calculated from the predicted results in an Entrants' submission and 
the ground truth of a validation dataset. At the close of the 
competition, the scores and associated ranks on the Public Leaderboard 
will be calculated from the predicted results and ground truth in the 
private testing dataset to confirm accuracy. The top-3 Entrant(s), 
based on the results using the private testing database, will be 
declared as tentative Prize Winners.
    (b) A week before the end of the competition, there will be a 
visualization competition. The goal of this competition will be to 
create insightful visualizations from the data that was provided for 
the predictive modeling competition. There will be a single winner who 
will be chosen by Kaggle community vote on the Web site. This winner of 
the visualization competition will receive one thousand dollars as a 
prize.
    (c) The evaluation metric that forms the basis for the Leaderboard 
scores will be displayed on the Web site. Because of variability in 
block group population counts, the evaluation metric may be weighted by 
the 2010 Census population block group count.
    (d) As a condition of receipt of the prize, the winner(s) must 
deliver the algorithm's code and documentation to the Census Bureau. 
The source code must contain a description of resources required to 
build and run the algorithm. The individual winner, or each individual 
on a team should the winner be a team Entrant, will be required to 
complete, sign and return a Declaration of Eligibility, Non-Exclusive 
License, and Release form.
    (e) The prize may be delivered by U.S. mail or electronically. To 
facilitate electronic delivery, the winner will need to submit 
financial account information sufficient to support electronic transfer 
of the prize.
    (f) Regardless of the method of delivering the prize money, the 
Entrant(s) may be subject to Federal and/or state income taxation. 
Entrant(s) may be required to fill out tax and related forms before 
receiving the prize. Kaggle will provide necessary forms at the end of 
the challenge to the winning Entrants.
    (g) For more information on judging and judging procedures, please 
refer to http://www.kaggle.com/c/us-census-challenge/details/rules.
    (6) Intellectual property/Copyright. Each Entrant warrants, upon 
submitting an entry, that he or she is the sole owner of the 
submission, and that the submission is wholly original with the Entrant 
and does not infringe on any copyright or other rights of any third 
party of which the Entrant is aware. Each Entrant (a) grants to Census 
Bureau and its designees a worldwide, non-exclusive, sub-licensable, 
transferable, fully paid-up, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable 
license to use, not use, reproduce, distribute, create derivative works 
of, publicly-perform, publicly-display, digitally-perform, make, have 
made, sell, offer for sale and import each Entry and the algorithm used 
to produce the Entry, in any media now known or hereafter developed, 
for any purpose whatsoever, commercial or otherwise, without further 
approval by or payment to Entrant (the ``License'') and (b) that he/
she/it has the unrestricted right to grant the License.
    (8) General. In the Census Bureau's sole discretion, the Census 
Bureau may cancel, suspend, and/or modify the competition, in whole or 
part, for any reason. By participating in this competition, the 
Entrant(s) fully and unconditionally agrees to abide by all competition 
rules stated in this Notice and found at www.kaggle.com.

    Dated: September 14, 2012.
Thomas L. Mesenbourg, Jr.,
Acting Director, Bureau of the Census.
[FR Doc. 2012-23333 Filed 9-20-12; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-07-P