Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Becoming a Certified Genealogist - An Update

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!

5 comments:

  1. Lori,


    I want to let you know that your blog post is listed in today's Fab Finds post at http://janasgenealogyandfamilyhistory.blogspot.com/2016/01/follow-friday-fab-finds-for-january-15.html

    Have a great weekend!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Take it from someone who needed two extensions (abd writing very hard not to need a third), you're doing exceptionally well, Lori. Keep it up and get it done :-)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Take it from someone who needed two extensions (abd writing very hard not to need a third), you're doing exceptionally well, Lori. Keep it up and get it done :-)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks, Yvette! I really needed to hear that today - I almost had a heart attack in the car this evening when I stopped to read my email at a red light and realized BCG changed the rubric. After dinner I looked at the changes and realized they were minor, though I do need to go back and rewrite my document work research statement - my original is 2 parts and that's no longer accepted. My process has been to 1) Read the rubric 2) Pull the research/analyze/write/edit 3) Review the Application Guide 4) Make any changes and then 5) Reread the rubric. Since my next step is the KDP, yesterday I went to the Work Samples on the BCG Skillbuilder site and thought I'd re-read before I picked up where I left off with my KDP in November. That's when I decided I would do another check of my finished items and just give a cursory look at the samples to insure I was doing everything correctly. I then started confusing myself regarding the Case study so maybe I'm really not where I thought I was. To make sure, I just posted the question on the BCG Google group. I sure hope I'm just overly tired from taking a group of middle school students out into the woods all day today and my paper is acceptable. Keeping my fingers crossed - Lori

    ReplyDelete

10 Million Names Enslaved Project

AI Generated Do you have enslaved or enslavers in your family tree? If so, your research is needed in support of the 10 Million Names Proje...