Planning Ahead for Continuing Education

We're finally into the middle of summer, yet what is uppermost in my mind today is an event buried under the snow of winter. By the time you read this, I will have, hopefully, successfully completed my registration for next January's Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy.

SLIG, as it's called by its more-handy moniker, is a week-long immersion in specific genealogical research topics, offered by the Utah Genealogical Association. This coming January, there will be fifteen courses offered by nationally-recognized instructors on a wide variety of topics—not to mention the additional offerings either extending the week's learning, or preceding it (with a twist), meeting learners virtually in the comfort of their own homes.

In the past, I've focused mainly on the courses offered in genetic genealogy, where I've been privileged to learn from luminaries such as Blaine Bettinger and CeCe Moore. Last year, I broke away from that realm to bolster my skills in a different arena: research in archives and through manuscript collections.

This year, once again, I hope to pick up skills in another area. I want to attend the course on Southern Research. This course, directed by J. Mark Lowe, hadn't been offered in the last couple years, but I know from past experience and word-of-mouth recommendation from friends who had attended the course previously that it is well worth taking.

Now that the opportunity has come up once again, I won't be waiting until the last minute to register. This calls for deploying a different strategy: sitting at my computer with my mouse pointed to click on the SLIG website link at the split second registration officially opens. If I can help it, I mean to get in well before the dreaded wait list icon pops up.