Sunday, September 26, 2021

From the Archives - Into the 21st Century with SAG

In the ten years since I penned the post below I have hosted and presented several webinars in the Society of Australian Genealogists Education Program. 

From one session a month in 2011 the Society now hosts several sessions each week, some are presented on the GotoWebinar platform while many are now presented on Zoom which allows for easier interactive participation by attendees. 

For five years I have been a proud member of the SAG Education Committee which assists and advises the staff of the Society with program delivery and development. We regularly host international expert presenters from overseas which provide our members access to learn from geneastars without having to grab a passport and hop on a plane.  Recently the SAG opened up attendance at these sessions to non-members so genies anywhere in Australia and overseas can learn from home. 

Since the Covid19 pandemic hit in March 2020 all SAG events have been delivered online giving members in regional and remote areas opportunities to receive high quality education.  The popular Members' Hangouts during the pandemic have given members an opportunity to socialise and chat while absorbing online tips and shared stories from fellow researchers. I know more SAG members now than I ever did during my many years of membership.

You can access the SAG Education Program here on their website, https://www.sag.org.au/events.

Following is my report of the very first hangout in 2011. Thanks to Heather Garney and Martyn Killion for their vision in launching this impressive program.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Into the 21st Century with SAG

Thursday night, with Captain Heather Garnsey at the helm, I joined around 60 other members  of  SAG (The Society of Australian Genealogists) in SAG's first paid webinar for members. It is so good to see this organisation employing technology to reach out to members.

Thanks Heather for permission to post this image
Genealogists from a number of Australian States and rural and metropolitan areas in NSW joined Heather for the event. Instead of an hour's trip by car to get to SAG in the city I only had to spend a few minutes firing up the computer to get my fix of CGD. For members who live in rural areas getting to SAG for educational events is extremely difficult. Hopefully this initiative will snag a few new members for SAG.

I salute Heather on her competent management of the GoToWebinar software that is used for delivery. She did a great job drivng it while presenting her talk. As SAG are charging $10 for the webinar and, as they should be getting the software for a song (hope Aussie organisations get the great deals available to non-profit organisations in the US), perhaps they could afford to have another person online to support the presenter.

NSW Shipping Records Online was the topic for Heather's talk. Although introductory in nature I learnt a few new tricks from the talk that concentrated on online records at Ancestry.com.au and State Records of NSW.   Added to my todo list is to take a look at these records for the ancestors whose immigration details I found years ago - I should be able to find more details to flesh their profiles. After her formal presentation Heather responded to attendees questions.

Webinars are a wonderful way to present educational and information sessions via the web. I attend on average one per week, this week I have tuned into three. A list of webinars available to genealogists can be found at the Geneawebinars calendar. The SAG webinars are not listed on this site

Future SAG Webinars
It appears that SAG has at least one webinar a month scheduled for the future. Anyone is able to visit the SAG site to find details of these forthcoming educational offerings (scroll to bottom of page) but you will have to become a member to join in.

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