High-school students cringe when asked to use statistics in their homework. Crunching those kinds of numbers is not a process for the uninitiated.

But Statistics Canada, one of the world's most reputable collectors of census data, is making its vast trove of numbers available in a way those students will find easier to understand.

In a project called E-Stat, Statscan is offering their services to 8,000 high schools, colleges and universities full interactive access to census data.

Using a data publishing, analysis and reporting software from Ottawa-based Databeacon Inc., Statscan is hoping to make the process of studying the census statistics a lot less painful.

With Databeacon, Statscan hopes students will find it easier to conduct their research on-line, and manipulate the data to draw their own conclusions.

Databeacon's software has been added to E-Stat to provide a new output format for site visitors interested in drilling down to do analysis of multidimensional charts and graphs as well as statistical analysis of data tables.

"Students and teachers from thousands of Canadian and international schools can experience data publishing, analysis and reporting," Databeacon president and CEO Andy Coutts said in announcing the project.

It is "is something we hope will help us demonstrate our value proposition for many other e-government applications," he added.