US Records Study Group: Assignment 1

As part of my goal of becoming a professional genealogist, I recently joined the US Records Study Group. The group was started by Tonia Kendrick and Valerie Elkins and will do an in-depth study of The Researcher's Guide to American Genealogy and The Source. To keep myself on track and accountable to myself and the group, I will be doing my assignments here at Ancestrally Challenged.

Assignment 1-Rate organization and research evaluation skills. Set goals for improvement.

Well, there's good and there's bad. On the good side, I do generally cite my sources, keep what I've found organized, and take notes pretty much anyone should be able to decipher. On the bad side, I don't consistently use my research logs, don't write summaries of a research session so I can pick it back up later and rarely write reports so I can fully evaluate what I have found and what is missing.

My goals to improve my organization and research evaluation skills are

• Use my research log every time I do research.
• Write a summary of what I have already searched and ideas for future research after each research session.
• Write a research report on one ancestor per week.