The Estimates Methods Research Conference was very well received by authors, presenters and those in attendance. Even though the time for each presentation was limited because of the number of presentations being given (22), we were able to gain a lot of valuable information. A variety of methods, approaches, and data sources provided us with enough research and possible dissertation topics for the next decade. A few of the staff from the Census Bureau, a few state representatives from the Federal State Cooperative for Population Estimates (FSCPE), and a few additional experts on population estimates met on the day following the conference to discuss how to best proceed. Members of this group are still discussing how best to encourage as much research as possible, so as to find new techniques which will assist us in improving the quality of the estimates after Census 2000. We hope that anyone who is interested will explore these ideas and topics, either individually or in conjunction with the authors as appropriate.

These proceedings contain all the abstracts of papers or presentations we accepted, a table summarizing and comparing the papers and presentations, some of the final versions of papers and presentations, and some of the questions that were asked of the presenters along with their responses. We will make any additional papers or presentations from the conference available as they are received.

If you have any comments, do not hesitate to contact the authors or us here at the Census Bureau.