Transparency in Statistical Information for the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics and All Federal Statistical Agencies

Widely available, trustworthy government statistics are essential for policy makers and program administrators at all levels of government, for private sector decision makers, for researchers, and for the media and the public. In the United States, principal statistical agencies as well as units and programs in many other agencies produce various key statistics in areas ranging from the science and engineering enterprise to education and economic welfare. Official statistics are often the result of complex data collection, processing, and estimation methods. These methods can be challenging for agencies to document and for users to understand. At the request of the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES), this report studies issues of documentation and archiving of NCSES statistical data products in order to enable NCSES to enhance the transparency and reproducibility of the agency's statistics and facilitate improvement of the statistical program workflow processes of the agency and its contractors. Transparency in Statistical Information for the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics and All Federal Statistical Agencies also explores how NCSES could work with other federal statistical agencies to facilitate the adoption of currently available documentation and archiving standards and tools. Table of Contents Front Matter Summary 1 Introduction 2 Current Practices for Documentation and Archiving in the Federal Statistical System 3 Changes in Archiving Practices to Improve Transparency 4 Assessments of Quality, Methods for Retaining and Reusing Code, and Facilitating Interaction with Users 5 Metadata and Standards 6 Making the Practices of the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics More Transparent 7 Best Practices for Federal Statistical Agencies References Appendix A: Statistical Metadata Standards - in Detail Appendix B: The Role of Metadata in Assessing the Transparency of Official Statistics Appendix C: Public Meeting Agendas Appendix D: Biographical Sketches of Panel Members Committee on National Statistics