Calling all Arbitrators

Spring time on the Farm in PA, taken by Bishop Bob Woolley 2014

Mark Your Calender

Six and one-half Million images await arbitration ! Familysearch is promoting a Worldwide Arbitration Event in May. Please consider helping out if you are already an arbitrator or contact me to find out how you can become one. (lgmgilbert2@yahoo.com  or 405-367-7159)

1. The Goal is to help more ancestors be found and to reduce the number of images awaiting arbitration by two million or more. This process must be accomplished before all of those indexed records can be released for publication and we can find our ancestors.
2. The start date is May 1, 2015, that is coming up soon.
3. The end date is May 8, 2015 - one week

Here are four tips that will help you to get ready for this event:

1. Read the Instructions, field helps and project instructions, even if you have read them before. Review, there have been many changes including an abbreviated guide for indexing obituaries.
2. Record Match!   I consider this the most important thing you can do. Make sure indexer A and indexer B are on the same line. Be sure to hit the"finished" key after record matching or your arbitration work will NOT be saved.
3. Start now, in April,  by Indexing a batch from each project you plan to arbitrate.
4. Arbitrate in your own language, unless you have gotten special training in another language.

Plan to do a first-class job arbitrating. What you are doing is a crucial role in helping others to find these images online. 

Update on New Indexing Program

The new indexing program is coming later this year, here are some of the things you can expect to see: [taken from the FamilySearch Blog page; see Aug 4, 2014 by Katie Gale for more details]
 click here:  FamilySearch Blog

• Single-key indexing of selected projects. This will involve simple projects, like printed or typewritten records. These records are indexed accurately by the majority of indexers so only one person needs to index them, and no one will arbitrate them. Rather than our current system where two people index the same thing. There will be an audit process that can catch major indexing mistakes and if the audit sees a lot of mistakes a peer review or arbitration process will be added.
• Single-key indexing plus peer review. A single indexer will index and a second indexer will review the completed work. In some projects the second indexer can add corrections to the values, and both entries will be included in the searchable index.  As an indexer you will have to index a minimum number of records before you are allowed to review others' work. Familysearch will decided who can do the peer reviews.
• Single-key indexing by field. This involves fields such as Age or Event Year, which are generally transcribed accurately by most indexers and do not need to be reviewed or arbitrated. The new system will bypass these additional steps and cut down on the number of items that arbitrators need to look at, thus speeding up the process.
• Single-key indexing by qualified volunteers. More experienced indexers sometimes reach a point where review or arbitration of their work may actually increase errors. Indexers who reach this level of quality will have their work directly routed to publication, bypassing any reviews. Familysearch will determine who these indexers are and will run periodic audits to ensure the quality of their work.

I am sure you will love this new indexing program when it is finally released. For those of you who are Group Administrators, and yes you still are one even with our Stake reorganization, please go into the Beta version and play around with batches so you can see what the changes will be like. Nothing you do in the Beta version is going to be saved or published, it is just a "sandbox", a place to practice. I personally like the peer review, because it enlists the help of other indexers, even though they are not arbitrators. This should reduce the workload of the arbitrators.

Please keep Indexing and Arbitrating, our activity has really fallen off in April. Be sure to put in your new Ward name in your personal profile, so the new Ward can get credit for your work.

March OKC Stake Indexing Reports

Happy Easter to the Oklahoma City Stake Indexers and Arbitrators

Easter weekend is here and what a perfect way to remember Jesus Christ. Click on the Link below to watch this wonderful, short, video from Mormon.org.

Because He Lives

185th Semi-Annual Conference of The Church of 

Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Saturday April 4th and Sunday April 5th

photo taken by Lois Gilbert from the roof 

of the Conference Center Salt Lake City

Broadcast times in Oklahoma are

 from 11:00am - 1:00 pm

3:00 pm - 5:00 pm

Saturday and Sunday with Priesthood meeting 

on Saturday night from 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

You can view these sessions at the Stake Center or from you home.

There may be other Church Buildings that are going to show these sessions so contact

a Ward leader to find out.

March Stake Indexing Report

          WARD                              #INDEXED       #ARBITRATED

• Clinton                                                          262
• Edmond First                                             1888
• Edmond Second                                         8289                                   3106  
• Okc Fifth                                                    1299                                    4678
• Okc First                                                    6050                                    1592   
• Okc Fourth Branch                                       16
• Okc Third                                                   2347                                    
• Quail Creek                                                2694                                    3761
• Village                                                         1785                                    2618
• Woodward Branch                                        11 

• Youth Edmond Second                                   14
• Youth Okc First                                               75
• Youth Okc Third                                             60
• Youth Village                                               2260 

Stake YTD Indexing

156,707 names

Every name you index, you change that person's life Forever!!

Those "Shaky Leaves" at Ancestry.com or "Hints" at FamilySearch Tree, have you seen them? They are there because Indexing facilities them! That's right, you and I make it possible, by Indexing.

 I am attracted to them, they pull me in just like a magnet. Almost everyday that  I go onto those sites to look at something I find some more. Right now I have 3956 Shaky leaves in my Ancestry tree, and 859 in my husbands tree!  I even see them on notices sent to my email!!!  Then my whole day, sometimes, is spent checking out the new record finds and adding them to my trees to document my ancestors life. 

It is fantastic how easy it is to do that. It is even more fantastic that you can do it all from home. Have you signed up for your free subscriptions to Ancestry.com? You should because it is now possible to coordinate both your Ancestry tree and your Familysearch tree. To read about this great option click on the link below.

FamilySearch Blog

Have a wonderful week-end. Please go into your Familysearch Indexing account and change your Ward name to match the Ward that you now attend. I think this is exciting news, that OKC Stake has grown so much we can create two new Wards. I look forward to getting Indexing going in all the Wards. Please do not stop indexing, this is a Celestial Calling, not a Ward calling!!! Happy Easter to all.

February 2015 Indexing Reports

taken by Lee Schuler - Pennsylvania

Oklahoma City Stake Indexing Reports for Feb 2015

Stake Cum YTD 115,456 names

February Indexing Stats by Ward:

    Ward                                                         Indexed        Arbitrated

• Clinton                                                       203
• Edmond First                                          3017                  3006
• Edmond Second                                      6892                  1684
• Okc Fifth                                                 1625                   4449
• Okc First                                                 7815                 14199
• Okc Third                                                 617                       21
• Quail Creek                                            5024                   3814
• Village Ward                                          2425                   4780
• Woodard Branch                                       37                       51        

Youth Indexing By Ward:

Ward                                                              Indexed              Arbitrated

• Okc Fifth                                                      66
• Okc First                                                       50
• Village Ward                                                                         4930

Oklahoma City Stake Indexing Social 

Thank you to all of you who could attend the Indexing Social last January 29th, 2015, for the recognition of  the top Indexers and Arbitrators and  the top Youth for the year 2014. There were about 28 members in attendance that night and we had a good time.  You may have seen the article and photo  in the Stake Winter Newsletter that recently was sent out. 

Thank you to everyone for a fantastic kick-off of 2015 Indexing and Arbitration. Looking at the report for February, I see that we have arbitrated more names this month than we indexed. We have never done that.  Good work! I am trying to increase the number of Arbitrators in our Stake. Right now we have about 5% Arbitrators out of all those signed up to Index, and I would love to see it jump to 10%. So if you would like to learn about arbitration please contact me or your Ward's Group Administrator.

Dennis Brimhall, the CEO of FamilySearch said at RootsTech 2015, that every name you index  means you have changed that persons life forever!!!  I have been pondering that statement and it changes the way I think about the time spent indexing. We should also be preparing the names of our ancestors to take to the Temple.

Check out the new poster on the Family History Center Bulletin Board at the Stake Center for 2015 

End of the Year 2014 Report

Stake Conference January 24th, and 25th.

Oklahoma City Stake Presidency

Pres. Howard Haralson, Pres. Tom Gray, Pres. Darren Waltman

OKC Stake Year End Indexing & Arbitration Totals

                    Ward                            # Indexed                # Arbitrated

• Clinton                                              4715                                  
• Edmond First                                  42523                         28662
• Edmond Second                              25745                           9361
• Okc Fifth                                           6164                          33438
• Okc First                                          52755                         43965
• Okc Third                                        14967                           3383
• University                                               15
• Primary Fifth Ward                                2
• Quail Creek                                     55616                         57191      top Indexing Ward 2014
• Village Ward                                    21505                        38482
• Woodward Branch                            2638                          7568

Youth 

• Edmond Second                                   320
• Okc Fifth                                             3086
• Okc First                                             8263                              2010  top Indexing Youth Ward 2014
• Okc Third                                             544
• Village                                                 1471                              3162

Total Number of Names Indexed and Arbitrated in 2014 for the OKC Stake

468,540

Top 5 Indexers, Arbitrators and Youth Indexers in 2014

Sunset at 7R Ranch,Texas

Taken by Brother Robert Silvers 2014

Below you will find the names of those in the OKC Stake who made the Top 5 List for 2014. This is based upon the total number of names you either Indexed or Arbitrated. It is not based upon the total "points" that you earned. All numbers were provided by FamilySearch.  These people will be honored at the Stake  Indexing Social on Friday night, January 30th at 7PM at the Stake Center. Congratulations to all of you for your hard work and I hope to see even more people indexing in 2015.   

Top 5 Indexers in 2014 are:

Edmond First = Jessie Crawford - 28,503

Quail Creek   = Nora Muzingo    - 23,582

Village Ward = Erin LeBlanc      - 11,853

Okc First        =Wilma White      - 11,714

Quail Creek    = Donna Saxon     -   8943  

Top 5 Arbitrators in 2014 are:

Village Ward  = Gene Bushman - 38,482

Okc 5th Ward = Mary Butts       - 33,253

Edmond First = Judy McGraw   - 28011

Quail Creek   = Charles Howell - 26,553

Quail Creek   = Colette Datin     - 19,792

Top 5 Youth Indexers in 2014 are:

Okc First  = Emma Aquino  - 4731

Okc First =  Falyn Crawford - 4429

Village Ward - Courtney Wilkinson  - 4110

Okc Fifth =  Bailey Ingram  - 2917

Okc First = Vanessa Aquino - 1113

Good Job !!!

December Indexing and Temple News

Arlington Cemetery, Arlington,VA (taken by Pamela Brown Reid 2014)

Stake To Honor Top 5 Indexers and Top 5 Arbitrators

Mark your Calendars for January 30th, a Friday night at 7:00 PM - 8:30 PM for a social to honor the top 5 Indexers, top 5 arbitrators and the top 5 Youth indexers in our Stake.  These indexers and arbitrators and their families are invited. The Top Indexing Ward, Quail Creek, is also invited. Listed below are the names of those who made the top 5 list. (Next week the year end report will be posted for your Ward.)

Top 5 Indexers:                                                         Top 5 Arbitrators:

Jessie Crawford, Edmond First                                 Judy McGraw, Edmond First

Nora Muzingo, Quail Creek                                     Gene Bushman, Village

Erin LeBlanc, Village                                               Mary Butts, Okc 5th

Wilma White, Okc 1st                                              Charles Howell, Quail Creek

Donna Saxon, Quail Creek                                       Colette Datin, Quail Creek

Top 5 Youth Indexers

Courtney Wilkinson, Village

Bailey Ingram, Okc 5th

Emma Aquino, Okc 1st

Vanessa Aquino, Okc 1st

Falyn Crawford, Okc 1st

I would like to personally thank all of the Indexers in the Stake for their hard work in 2014.  Indexing is a great way to Serve the Lord, from home. The names that we index and arbitrate, provide researchers, perhaps ourselves, with the opportunity to prepare to take our ancestors  names to the Temple.

Gifts: A Progress Report from FamilySearch Blog

August 4, 2014 by Katie Gale - a summation

FamilySearch recently announced that they have one billion images of historical documents available on-line and viewable on FamilySearch.org. Of that amazing number only 22 percent of them are indexed. We still have a lot of work to do, so that we can easily search for these documents. The people at FamilySearch are working hard to make the best use of volunteers' gifts of time and talent.  

Most of the advancements are coming in the new indexing program, next year, but there are several things that you may have seen already. Recently I have downloaded batches that are called "Single-key indexing projects". This means that simple projects, like typewritten records, that are indexed accurately by most volunteers, will only be transcribed once, by one indexer and will not be arbitrated. The quality will be monitored closely and if the quality of a project drops, a peer review or arbitration process will be added.  You can tell if you have downloaded one of these batches, by reading the message that pops up when the download is completed, just before you start to work on the batch. When I get one of these batches, I take my time and check for typos before I submit it. It appears that your accuracy is the key factor in determining if you are eligible to index these "single Key" batches. 

2015 Stake Indexing Goal

 The Indexing goal for our Stake in 2015 is more than a number. While we would like to keep our 2014 goal of 1 Million names, indexed and arbitrated, we are also going to encourage our Stake indexers to prepare Family File names to take to the Temple. Each Ward gets a report from Salt Lake on how many members are doing family file names at the Temple. The percentage is not very high for our Stake. We would like to see an increase in that number as well as in our Indexing results for 2015.

Last week at the Temple, President Hanson told us that he has been asked by the Temple department to increase the number of "Family Baptism Sessions". It seems that this special time, for families at the baptismal font, has been very successful and Salt Lake would like to see more time given for parents to come with their children and family names. 

 As a result of this, President Hanson is adding 8 more Family Baptism times to our monthly schedule at the Oklahoma City Temple.  He said he will add these extra family baptismal sessions, starting in February,  early on Friday nights and on Saturday afternoons, every week . The exact time of these Family Baptismal Sessions will be announced later. There is no need to make a reservation, just show up with your children and your family file names. 

November Indexing Report 2014

Philadelphia Pennsylvania Temple - to be dedicated in 2016

It has been a long time since I have posted any indexing reports to this blog. I hope that I can now get started back at keeping all of our 735 Stake Indexers updated on the valuable service that they are doing. I would like to thank all of you that have indexed or arbitrated this year. We hope to have an even better year in 2015. There are lots of Obituaries to work on and I will be posting helpful hints on how to decide what the relationship to the deceased should be. Please check back here often to see new hints! Obituaries are very valuable and there are tons of them to do. They contain lots of information and many names, , we need your help!

 FamilySearch is looking for anyone who is an arbitrator, to learn how to arbitrate the obituary project. If you can, please take time to arbitrate an extra obituary this month. After Christmas, in January, we will have a training session for all indexers and arbitrators with specific training in obituaries. Thank you again for all that you do to help with this great Service effort.

November 2014 Indexing/Arbitrating Report

53,863 total names for month!

(our highest month this year)
Thank you everyone!!!!! 

Stake Year to Date Indexing/Arbitration
417,558 names  !!!

• Clinton                        734
• Edmond First           6821
• Edmond Second       5612
• OKC Fifth                 2820
• OKC First              16,404 
• OKC Third               3492
• Quail Creek              5676
• Village                        6502
• Woodward                  3211

 OKC Youth Totals for November 

• Okc First Ward              2591

I would like to Challenge all of you to help us make it to 500,000 names by December 31st!

Obituary Helpful Tips:

These tips come from  mistakes that I see when I arbitrate obituaries. The most common mistake is trying to determine the correct relationship to the deceased. Since you can not determine the gender of an individual by the name, you have to decide if you will need to use a generic relationship term. 

For Example: when do I use Parent verses when do I use Mother or Father?

1. If the obit says: daughter of John and Mary Metzger Smith 

          You would index it as: Relationship =  parent for both names;

Parent = John (given name)  Smith ( surname)

Parent =  Mary Metzger (given names)  Smith (surname)

You can not determine the gender from the given names. 

  2.  If the obit says:  daughter of John and Mary (Metzger) Smith

      

       You would index it as: Relationship would be Father, then Mother 

          Father = John (given name) Smith (surname)

 and  Mother = Mary (given Name), Metzger Smith ( surnames)

y

You can determine that Mary is a female by her maiden name in Parentheses 

3. If the name of the Deceased (always entered as the #1 name in all obits) is shown to be Ruby Mary Metzger Smith, and you can see the name Metzger with her father's name, ie., John Metzger, then you can use Metzger Smith as the Surname of the Deceased. But, you can only do that if you see that  the father's surname matches. You should read the whole obit before you start indexing.

 It would look like this:

Deceased: Ruby Mary (given Name)  Metzger Smith (surname)

If the Father's last name is different and does not match that of the deceased,  then it would be entered this way:

Deceased: Ruby Mary Metzger (given names) Smith (surname)

First Quarterly Indexing Report 2014

Salt Lake City Temple, Feb 2014

Where does Indexing fit in??

Indexing is family history. It turns the hearts to the Father's and helps to provide the way for members of The Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to find their ancestors records and prepare a way to take those names to the Temple.

 Indexing increases the work of Salvation. Indexing is a tool to increasing spiritual righteous and to hasten the work. It took 78 years to produce the first (1) Billion searchable records for Family Search. It took 7 year, with indexing, to make the next billion records available. 

The 2014 invitation to you is to submit one name to the Temple, if you are indexing, and to index one batch if you have already submitted that name, this year. This is something that I believe every member of our Stake can do.

Family History Video - click on link below

Quarterly Indexing Report

Jan - March 2014

88,017
names indexed and arbitrated