The African Kinship Reunion - TAKiR

28/06/2025

"Evanston’s Reparations Committee also participated in the event by passing out free DNA kits as part of the statewide Family Roots Pilot Program, an ongoing collaboration with the African Kinship Reunion (TAKiR) project. After taking the tests at the committee’s table, African American descendants of enslaved individuals have the opportunity to explore their genealogy as a form of cultural healing, according to La Kisha Latham, a TaKiR community affiliate."

The Evanston community danced with joy on Saturday during its sixth annual Juneteenth Celebration & Freedom Parade, which concluded with festivities at Ingraham Park celebrating local Black legacies. Despite the weekend’s extreme heat warnings and the day’s nearly triple-digit weather, hundreds ...

22/06/2025

FREE DNA test distribution on Juneteenth in Chicago!
CWCRC led the on-the-ground distribution of free DNA test kits for genealogy during the first public giveaway event. The kits are provided at no cost through the Illinois Family Roots Pilot Program, managed by The African Kinship Reunion (TAKiR).
Live in Illinois and want a free DNA test to explore your family history? Visit www.takir.org and sign up today!

11/06/2025

RIGHT NOW: Our system is actively validating over 6,600 DNA profiles (mostly from the OpenSNP dataset)! 🧬✨

This marks a huge step forward in building the comprehensive genetic repository that will power your personalized TAKiR experience. Each validated profile brings us closer to creating the connections that will help reconstruct your extended family networks.

What's happening behind the scenes:
🔹 File Validation – Converting and quality-checking thousands of genetic profiles (IN PROGRESS)
🔹 Quality Control Pipeline – Ensuring data accuracy and reliability (ROLLING OUT)
🔹 IBD Analysis – Identifying genetic segments you share with others (ROLLING OUT)
🔹 Family Tree Inference – Using bonsai v2 and v3 to reconstruct family relationships based on your DNA profile (ROLLING OUT)

Every profile we process increases the chances of finding YOUR genetic relatives and building meaningful family connections.

This massive processing effort is laying the foundation for the personalized features we promised for Summer 2025 – your Family Tree, Ancestry Connections, Relatives Map, and secure messaging with genetic relatives.

🔹 Illinois Family Roots Pilot Program Update: For those waiting on free DNA kits, we are awaiting final IRB approval and expect the program to be reviewed on June 12. Thank you for your patience!

Thank you for your continued participation. More exciting updates coming soon!

10/06/2025

DECO contract signed!

We have a signed contract between the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) and the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign (UIUC) of $500,000 for the Illinois Family Roots Pilot Program! A big shout-out of gratitude to our champion of the cause, State Representative Carol Ammons!

Of note, in the Project Description section:

"At the Carl R. Woese Institute for Integrated Genomic Biology, the Grantee operates the Family Roots Pilot Program. Created by House Resolution 453 passed by the Illinois House of Representatives, the Family Roots Pilot Program aims to address the historical legacy of family separation caused by slavery in the United States. Due to the force separation of African American families during slavery, as well as inadequate support for reunification during the Reconstruction era, many members of the African American community have been deprived of familial connections, heritage, and cultural identity, leading to long-lasting psychological, social, and economic impacts. Under the program, the Grantee will help African American descendants of enslaved individuals learn more about their African ancestral heritage and familial connections through genetic testing. The program takes a genealogy-based approach to restorative justice and aims to fulfill a social responsibility to repair past harms and foster a sense of justice beyond the traditional legal system. The Grantee anticipates assisting approximately 1,600 individuals of African descent in Illinois with this program."

"The completion of this project will benefit the public by providing a restoration of lost familial connection, heritage, and cultural identity for African American descendants of enslaved individuals. This project will help to address the systemic injustice of family separation during slavery, as well as the lack of institutional support during the Reconstruction era, that prevented reunification and harmed communities across the state. Participants will reconnect with their African history, leading to individual and collective healing. This will lead to closer community ties and help to serve as an important reestablishment of identity for marginalized individuals in Illinois."

08/06/2025

🚨 Exciting Update from the TAKiR Team! 🚨
As I write this post, we are uploading 7,577 DNA profiles from OpenSNP into our TAKiR database! 🧬

These profiles come from a public resource, and although you won’t be able to contact those individuals directly, their presence in the database can still benefit you. If one of these profiles bridges the genetic gap between you and another TAKiR user, our system will use that information to help reconstruct your extended family tree—linking relatives across generations and continents. 🌍🌳

This is just one of many steps we’re taking to build the most powerful, ethically grounded, and community-focused genetic genealogy platform available to people of African descent.

🌟 Coming Summer 2025 🌟
We’re excited to roll out TAKiR’s personalized services, designed to help you explore your African heritage and reconnect with your extended family:

🔹 Family Tree – See your extended family unfold in an interactive tree that grows as new connections are discovered.
🔹 Ancestry Connections – Understand your relatedness to people of African descent across multiple generations.
🔹 Learn About Relatives – View customized profiles of your relatives, including shared ancestry and historical context.
🔹 Relatives List – Browse a curated list of your known relatives, updated as new connections are found.
🔹 Relatives Map – Explore where your relatives are located across the globe with a real-time interactive map.
🔹 Connect With Relatives – Use secure in-app messaging to connect directly with genetic relatives and build new relationships.

This is just the beginning. Every data point brings us closer to reconnecting families, telling fuller stories, and supporting healing through knowledge. Thank you for being part of this journey.

01/06/2025

28/05/2025

Subject: Login Service Restored - Important Security Update

Dear BAGG Website Users,

We experienced a temporary login issue that has now been fully resolved. All users should be able to log in normally and receive SMS verification codes as expected.

What happened: We reached our SMS messaging limit of $1, which temporarily prevented verification codes from being sent during the login process. The $1 limit was initially set as a protective value while we were relaunching the website.

What we've done:
- Increased our SMS capacity to prevent future interruptions
- Added monitoring systems to alert us before limits are reached

In the process of addressing the login process, we also:
- Implemented additional security protections, including advanced threat detection

Your genetic data security remains our top priority. While addressing the login issue, we took the opportunity to improve our data security. These new measures provide stronger protection against unauthorized access while maintaining a smooth login experience.

If you continue to experience issues logging in, please contact our support team.

Thank you for your patience and for trusting us with your genetic information.

The BAGG Website Team

24/05/2025

"They welcome me and our family back into the fold. Whether they were Mandinka or Wolof or whether they were Igbo. I am one proud African." — H Okafor (An African American man speaking on his experiences finding African relatives)

https://www.takir.org/ Voices of Discovery: Family Identity

The African Kinship Reunion (TAKiR) is a pioneering research project that harnesses the power of genetic testing, genealogical research, and social science to help people of African descent reconnect with their ancestral roots and long-lost family members scattered by the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

16/05/2025

Join us for a night of storytelling, healing, and reconnection.

Award-winning filmmaker Peres Owino and State Representative Carol Ammons will take part in a powerful community dialogue following a screening of Bound: Africans vs. African Americans—a documentary that explores the historic tensions between Africans and African Americans and the opportunities for reconnection.

🧬 Learn about the Illinois Family Roots Pilot Program, created in response to House Resolution 453, which encourages people of African descent to explore their roots through genetic genealogy.

🍽️ Dinner is provided. Free admission.

📅 Saturday, June 14 | 5:00–8:30 PM
📍 Illini Union Ballroom, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
🎟️ RSVP now → https://www.eventbrite.com/e/1223178904029?aff=oddtdtcreator

🎞️ Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oshAs5ZKjsQ

26/02/2025

What do boxes for 1,500 free DNA kits for Illinois look like?

17/02/2025

https://www.ncsa.illinois.edu/the-ties-that-find

30/01/2025

Our last sample set from Ghana processed!
48 samples
1.8 million SNPs!

I'm so excited to place them in the tree tomorrow!