Education Updates to 2006 Census Dictionary and Education Reference Guide

March 9, 2010 RELEASE: Education updates to the 2006 Census Dictionary and the Education Reference Guide, 2006 Census

As a follow-up to the March 4, 2008 release of education data, the 2006 Census Dissemination Project is pleased to announce that updates have been made to the education content in the 2006 Census Dictionary and the Education Reference Guide, 2006 Census. The Education Reference Guide was originally released on August 5, 2008.

The updates to the Education Reference Guide, 2006 Census were made to include updates to its content regarding classification and concordance tables, secondary (high) school graduation certificate or equivalent and major field of study.

The updates to the 2006 Census Dictionary were made to include updates to their content regarding concordance tables and the comparability of 2006 education data with that of previous censuses. Empirical concordance tables between systems of classification of the Major field of study variable have also been added to the Dictionary.

The updates to the 2006 Census Dictionary include:

Updates to six existing definitions for education variables:
Attendance at school
Degree in medicine, dentistry, veterinary medicine or optometry
Highest certificate, diploma or degree
Major Field of Study – Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP)
Major Field of Study (MFS)
Secondary (high) school graduation certificate or equivalent

The addition of two new definitions:

Major Field of Study – Major Field of Study (MFS) and Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) empirical concordance

Major Field of Study – Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) and Major Field of Study (MFS) empirical concordance

The addition of two new appendices S and T to show the concordance tables:

Appendix S: Major Field of Study – Empirical concordance tables between Major Field of Study (MFS) and Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) Canada 2000 codes

Appendix T: Major Field of Study – Empirical concordance tables between Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) Canada 2000 codes and Major Field of Study (MFS)

The MFS-CIP and CIP-MFS empirical concordances present relationships between categories of the Major Field of Study (MFS) classification and those of the Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP Canada 2000), based on information provided by the 2006 Census. The concordances provide mappings of the distributional relationships between the two classifications and can be used to convert counts from one classification system to the other.

For the Major field of study variable, the 2006 Census marked the transition year between the variable classified under the new CIP (Canada 2000) classification and the MFS classification used in previous censuses. Future censuses will present information coded to the CIP classification system only.

The concordance tables and accompanying explanatory notes can be found in Appendix S (MFS-CIP) and Appendix T (CIP-MFS) of the 2006 Census Dictionary (Internet only). Tables are presented for three common levels of aggregation of both classification systems and are available for free to all users via the Internet in HTML and downloadable CSV formats.

Please note that the Info-Census article entitled Census questions on education has been updated to reflect some
important changes associated with the historical comparability of some education variables.

As of 8:30 a.m. (Ottawa time) today, the updated 2006 Census Dictionary and the updated Education Reference Guide, 2006 Census are available for free to all users, via the Internet. The 2006 Census Dictionary is available in HTML and PDF formats, while Appendix S and Appendix T are available in HTML format only. The Education Reference Guide, 2006 Census is available in HTML format only.

Thank you.