SLCC Genealogy Course: Post #16 - Final Project

Where did the time go? I can't believe that I just handed in my Final Project for the Salt Lake Community College, Genealogy Course. The class that I just finished was the very first one in the series "Computer & Internet Tools for Genealogy" - CEGN-0001-001, Non-Credit, CEGN-0001-042, 3 Credit Hours. I was auditing the class so I don't receive any credits.  That's fine for me, I was only interested in the knowledge I could gain from the class.

Now I will have a break until the Spring Semester begins on Jan 13, 2014. The next class for me is "Intro to Genealogical Research" - CEGN 0010-001, Non-Credit, CEGN 0010-042, 3 Credit Hours.

Some of you may have noticed that I didn't post my usual Saturday or Sunday night weekly post on how the class was going for me. That's because this past Wednesday nothing was due for the class. We had two weeks to finish the Final Project. We had to submit a Pedigree Chart with us as the starting person. Then a family group sheet with us as a child. Then we had to submit a second family group sheet with one of our parents as a child. All of these had to show complete events with complete and evaluated sources and transcriptions. I had been doing this all along so I didn't have anything new to add. So I basically did nothing last week.

On Sunday I planned on working on the Final Project and write my article, but I caught some weird 24 hour bug. That's why I missed my weekly article. Monday, I started to look at the assignment and found out the Final Project wasn't due on Wednesday, like all the other assignments were. It was due Tuesday night. Yikes, I had to get started on the one thing that makes me panic - THE REPORT.

We had to state our goal, summarize our research and conclude with a list of more things that could be done in the future for these generations. It had to be no longer than 2-3 pages. This was one time we didn't have an example of what the report should look like. I really need examples to follow, so I Google "Genealogy Research Reports Examples" and found some that caught my fancy and then came up with my own thing.

It was a really good exercise for me to write the Research Report. I have never done that in all my years of genealogy. It made me stop and analysis my findings a little closer. It helped me spot a typo that made a big difference on someone's birth date. Spotting that typo made me do some more digging to make sure I was citing the right date, so it was very useful. The report was the perfect final step in compiling these past 16 weeks working on this genealogy project for class. Now I have a list of goals to pick up again at a later date.

After handing in the Final Project we had a survey to complete on the class. I'm going to give you some of the feedback I shared with them.

1. What did you find the most valuable about this course?

Answer: Working through the subject in an orderly manner and then practicing what I learned. It was more useful to me than all the genealogy conference classes I have attended over the years. 

2. Is there anything we can do to improve the online experience?

Answer: I think I would have liked a Skyped conference call with other students. Especially when we had online discussions. I missed the interaction of getting to know what the other students were going through and what they learned. Sometimes it's good to bounce ideas off of others too. 

3. Would you recommend this course to a friend? Why or why not?

Answer: Yes, I would strongly recommend this class to others. It works for the beginner as well as the seasoned genealogist. I wish I had this type of class and focus when I was beginning to do genealogy. 

There is one last thing I wanted to report on regarding this class. I took the opportunity to try out a new organizing system for keeping track of my digital records. I mentioned it in my "SLCC Genealogy Course: Post #5 - Organization" blog post. I tried out Lisa Louise Cook's method for organizing your hard drive. She's not the only one that uses this method. I see this file system used as examples all over the place. After using this filing method I have to say I don't like it. There are just to many folder to drill through to find anything. I prefer having a folder just for one family and then putting all their records inside that folder. So during the next month I am going to reorganize the filing system I created for this course. I'm not sure about the file naming method she uses either so I have to do more thinking on that part.

It's been great attending this first class in the Salt Lake Community College, Genealogy Course. I hope you join me when it starts up again in January 2014.

See ya tomorrow, for tomorrow is always another genealogy day!