Help for approvers

Group Lead Volunteers approve their sections, and the Group is approved by the District Lead Volunteer. The Group can’t be approved until the Group’s section returns have been approved by the Group Lead Volunteer; or the section has been closed. 

The District 14 – 24 Team Leader approves Explorer Scout Units returns, and the District return is approved by County/Area/Region (Scotland) Lead Volunteer. The District return cannot be approved until all of the Groups within the District and any Explorer and Network returns have been approved. 

County/Area/Region Scotland section returns are approved at this level and are themselves approved at Country or Region (England) level as appropriate. The County/Area/Region return cannot be approved until all of the Districts within the County/Area/Region returns have been approved. 

Once you’re happy that the return is correct, use the buttons at the bottom the page. If you wish to approve the page, select ‘These figures are confirmed as final’ and click the 'Save Changes' button. There’s validation on certain elements on each return and the return can’t be approved until all validation is passed. 
 
This year we have also added some warnings on the "prefer not to say" option to help you spot returns that may need additional checking.  

Please take care to check your data before submitting and approving a return. Once a return is approved the numbers will be considered final and will only be reopened in exceptional circumstances. 

When you click on the section you wish to close, below the links to ‘View’ and ‘Edit Return’, there’s a heading called ‘Status of Census Return’. There’s a drop-down box here which allows you to change the status from ‘Unapproved’ to ‘Closed’. Please note that this isn’t available if there’s any data in the section return. 

Closing a Group is done in the same manner but isn’t possible if there’s any data in the Group or any of the section returns for that Group. Please note that the status ‘Closed’ means that the section or Group is no longer active. This status should be used if there are no members in that section or Group. If a section or Group is marked as closed, please make sure it’s closed on the membership system as well. The Scout Support Centre can help you with this.

On the Census it is possible for people to declare their member’s gender, religion, ethnicity and disabilities as either 'self describe' or 'prefer not to say'.  

These categories were added because we positively recognise all genders, ethnicities, religions and disabilities, and we are aiming to better understand and serve our diverse membership. 

If a return you need to approve has many members who have been entered as 'self describe' or 'prefer not to say' (we have added some visual warnings to highlight this on the return) you should speak to the person that completed the return to understand how they got this information, and make sure they have not used these categories for speed or convenience.  

We should not make assumptions about our members, and these fields should only be used where this information is known because it’s been volunteered to the person completing the return, or it’s been asked in an anonymous way. 

If there are concerns about the sensitivity of this information, please remind people that all of the data collected is anonymised. 

If adults need support with these questions please refer them to the individual Census report guides, and to the downloads page where they will find template forms they can use with their members. 

If you are still unsure, please raise your concerns with your line manager.