Resources for County Vital Records Offices
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Office of Vital Records
Training for County Vital Records Professionals
The Minnesota Department of Health offers training for county vital records staff to learn how to respond to customer requests, issue documents in Minnesota Registration and Certification (MR&C), and more.
Office hours
Office hours provide local vital records professionals an opportunity to learn more about a featured topic, ask questions, and share information. Each session includes topic presentations, resources, and discussion. Every session reserves time for open forum. New and experienced staff are invited to participate. Send ideas for Office Hours topics to health.vitalrecords@state.mn.us.
October office hours
Join us for office hours to discuss how to issue “historical” vital records, which are birth and death records that were originally registered on paper in the county where the event occurred. The Office of Vital Records (OVR) is introducing a new job aid — Issuing Historical Birth and Death Records (PDF) — to assist county offices in issuing these records and acquiring copies of the paper records, if needed.
Wednesday, October 23, 2024, 8:30 - 9:30 a.m.
Join office hours on Microsoft Teams (Meeting ID: 288 214 944 24 | Passcode: dto2VM)
Join by phone (audio only): 651-395-7448 (Conference ID: 173 646 96#)
Recorded office hours
Acceptable ID (YouTube) October 20, 2021
Adoptions and Other Replaced Records (YouTube) June 22, 2022
Death Record Amendments (YouTube) February 16, 2022
Eligibility/Tangible Interest (YouTube) January 19, 2022
Helping Customers with Amendments (YouTube) November, 17 2022
Historical Vital Records (YouTube) August 17, 2022
Issuing specialty certificates (YouTube) January 18, 2023
MACO pre-session training - Recap (YouTube) March 2023
New Adoptee Access Law (YouTube) June 2024
Non-family eligible relationships (YouTube) June 2023
Parental Notices (YouTube) November 17, 2021
Partner Processes (YouTube) October 19, 2022
Paternity (YouTube) May 18, 2022
Security Paper Management and Reconciliation (YouTube) April 20, 2022
Training for new staff
Four recorded learning sessions help local issuance staff get started in their important role with basic information about vital records, MR&C, and issuing birth and death certificates. Each session shows resources available for the learner and links to recorded “Office Hours” training sessions which cover the specific relevant topics in greater detail.
Part 1 – Welcome to Vital Records – Introduces Minnesota statutes and administrative rules that govern vital records,, the Office of Vital Records (OVR), security concerns, certificate eligibility, and public/confidential record types.
Part 2 – Operations – Highlights daily tasks and processes and explains the difference between record corrections and amendments and different certificates and documents.
Part 3 – Demonstration (1) in the Minnesota Registration and Certification (MR&C) System
Part 4 – Demonstration (2) in the Minnesota Registration and Certification (MR&C) System – In the two-part demonstration, you'll observe searching for records, creating customer service requests, and issuing certificates and see some of the resources available to county vital record office staff members.
Part 5 – Self-directed exploration in the MR&CTRAIN system – Special access to the vital records database training system, an exact duplicate of MR&C System, to allow vital records professionals to practice using fictitious data and records. New staff wishing to try-out the system must complete a County Vital Records Office User Agreement (PDF) (please write “MR&CTRAIN” at the top of the form) to gain temporary access.
Test your knowledge
Use our Training checklist and quiz for new county vital records employees (PDF) to ensure you've done the recommended initial trainings and understand key vital records principles.
Track your training
Please take our training tracker survey any time you’ve completed a training session. It helps us gauge the reach of our classes and inform counties which of their staff have been trained.
Please provide feedback: Office of Vital Records Customer Satisfaction Survey