As you will recall, last year I launched my first genealogy course offering – most specifically, a 12-week intensive course on the basics of conducting online research in Latvian genealogy.

Response to the course has been great, but at the same time, the length of the course and the intensiveness of the course over such a long period of time also resulted in a lot of attrition and most people who started the course not having the time in their schedules to finish.

So with that in mind, I’ve decided to revamp the course offerings – breaking the courses down into smaller independent chunks, so people can take the courses that are most necessary for their personal needs.

Now I will be offering THREE separate courses, all playing an important part in helping you learn how to do your own Latvian genealogy research utilizing online resources. Each of the courses will now be FOUR weeks long, with two out of three of the courses being offered each month. Each course will be US$49, and they will be based on the three concepts of UNDERSTAND, USE and INTERPRET.

UNDERSTAND Latvian genealogy records – This course will take you through the context of Latvian genealogical research – not as intensive as my Historical Context course, but it will provide a basic historical overview as it relates to the most commonly used Latvian genealogical records, as well as information on names of people and places and how they changed over the years. There are no prerequisites for this course.

USE Latvian genealogy records – This course will be the most intensive one, but it is also the most vital. This course will teach you how to read the old records – both the old German orthography (first two weeks) and old Russian orthography (second two weeks). We will cover how to pick out names and how to recognize common and important words. There are no strict prerequisites for this course, but if you are completely new to Latvian genealogy research and have little to no familiarity with Latvian history and naming practices, I would recommend taking the UNDERSTAND course first.

INTERPRET Latvian genealogy records – This course will help you put it all together. We will dive into the specifics of the main records – birth, marriage and death records, as well as revision lists. We will locate and analyze records (you can also bring your own) to draw out the important information and put together family trees. This course WILL require previous experience with old German and Russian orthography – which can be fulfilled by either the USE course, or your own study, but if you are coming to the course without having taken a course with me before, I will test your knowledge of orthography and vocabulary to make sure you know what you need to for the course. If you pass this test, you will be allowed into the course, if not, then you will need to take the USE course first.

The first sessions for the UNDERSTAND and USE courses will start on February 1. A full schedule can be found here (please note there will be no courses offered in October and December). As mentioned above, each course is US$49, but if you want to pre-pay for all three, for a limited time (until January 18) this package will be US$129 – save almost $20 from buying them individually! You will then have a year to use all three courses.

Please let me know if you have any questions!