Tag: Applying for Genealogy Certification

Learning Patience as I complete by KDP

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com 31 March 2016

Spring Break has come and gone and I didn’t make my goal of having the rough draft of my Kinship Determination Project (KDP) completed.  I’m not complaining, though, as three events occurred that threw me into a tizzy!

First, less than a month ago, I received 30+ years of a diary written by the sister-in-law of one of the individuals I’m writing about.  It is a genealogical gold mine!  After reading and rereading I took notes based on individuals and then by types of events.  Spent the last three weeks incorporating the information into the KDP as it was quite useful and enhanced the paper.  Long term plan is to create an index of the diary for future use.

Second, our desktop system bit the dust.  I had my work saved in numerous places so that wasn’t awful but instead of a double screen I was back using (and sharing) an old laptop.  Really slowed the process down.

Last, I had changed my mind about taking a trip during my week’s vacation and instead, I had decided to spend that week working on the paper.  Plans changed when my husband fell off the roof.  Miraculously, he’s fine, however, we spent the week quite differently than expected.

Since he’s okay, a co-worker’s son was able to recover the data on our crashed system and the new information I added gave the paper more character, I’m fine with not meeting my goal.  My revised plan was to finish by the end of March, put it away for the month of April, check out the portfolios that will be available at the upcoming NGS conference in Ft. Lauderdale, revise through June and after taking one more trip through the archives to make sure that I left no stone unturned, submit in July.  Well, it’s the last day of the month and I’m not done.  I’m still waiting for six records to arrive that apply to the last generation. Have to read through about 100 handwritten letters that are 100 years old to mine for details.  New goal is mid April completion. That’s only obtainable if I work all day the next 3 weekends, spend at least 2 hours a night during the week AND get the records.  Genealogy is definitely a study in patience!

Becoming a Certified Genealogist – An Update

A FABULOUS FIND of 15 Jan 2016

Originally published on genealogyatheart.blogspot.com 13 Jan 2016

The clock is still ticking and now that we’re in the new year I’ve got less than 10 months to submit my portfolio requirements.  I actually accomplished way more than I thought I would during the holidays. My family kids me that I must be channeling the dead.  I don’t know about that but I certainly had some awesome finds that propelled me forward.  Here’s where I am and what I have to do:

1.  Preliminary application was submitted in October 2015 – DONE

2.  Signing the Genealogist’s Code – that’s easy!

3.  Background Resume – completed but needs to be reviewed and possibly updated right before submission – Almost Done

4.  Document Work – BCG Supplied and Applicant Supplied.  All transcribed and written, just need to review and make a final edit. – Almost Done

5.  Research Report prepared for another person – started this in late December.  This was unexpected but I loved the hunt so decided to switch what I originally had planned to submit that was already finished. Completed the newly started report on December 31st and gave it to client on January 4th – DONE

6.  Case Study – used a client’s second report I was working on instead of what I had originally thought I was going to do.  I finished it over the holidays with some wonderful documents that simply showed up!  Wish I could share this with you – a real twist and turn type of case. – Almost Done (haven’t given it to client yet but have appointment scheduled)

7.  Kinship Determination KDP- have a great start but didn’t work on it much in the past month.  I’m still assembling documents and my problem is I don’t live anywhere close to the areas that the family lived.  I’m planning on a trip in March to one of the states but that still leaves me with a hole on the east coast and I wasn’t planning on being close to that area until July.  So, it’ll be slow going with this item.  I figure, unless a miracle occurs, I won’t be done with this until September and will just make the deadline but who knows?  I put the rest of the requirements together in a much quicker time period than I planned so maybe this will come together, too.  KDP 1/3 Done

In hindsight, I’m glad that I had a skeletal idea of what I would be submitting before I actually committed to the process. I’m also thankful that I took the webinar about what certification entails so I had clear expectations of what was expected.

Here’s an update on my 2 past blogs regarding Ancestry.com and member family tree’s that reported a co-worker’s mother as deceased when she isn’t – I received an email from Ancestry staff on Monday directing me to have the deceased email them with her request to correct the records and to provide Ancestry with the URL’s of the trees.  I pulled the URL info and included it with the forwarded email to my co-worker who sent it off to her mom.  I was impressed that Ancestry responded so quickly, especially after the phone conversations I had with their support staff.  I didn’t think there was going to be any resolution!  I’m also very pleased that Ancestry stayed true to their confidentiality statement and understood how the problem impacted the affected family.  Kudos to Ancestry!