Tech Forum

In out Stake we have been asked to enter the weekly attendance records of Sunday School, Elder's Quorum/Relief Society and Primary, but we were only able to find the quarterly attendance report. Does MLS have the capability to enter a weekly attendance?

eyoshicl wrote:In out Stake we have been asked to enter the weekly attendance records of Sunday School, Elder's Quorum/Relief Society and Primary, but we were only able to find the quarterly attendance report. Does MLS have the capability to enter a weekly attendance?

No it does not. Make sure that people in your stake understand that the quarterly report should only be updated immediately following the end of each quarter. If a unit were to enter weekly attendance and then save it in MLS, it would get transmitted to HQ as a correction to the last quarterly report.

Here's a pain-in-the-neck-way to record attendance in MLS:

Make 104 custom membership fields

Attended_SundaySchool_week1, week2, week 3...week52
Attended_Priesthood_or_Relief_Society_week1,week2, week3...week52

They would then have a true/false value.

Of course, you would probably have to abbreviate the field
names to something cryptic like SS_wk1 and PHRS_wk1

Depending on how often the stake needs the info, you
could probably reduce the number of fields and record
in binary.

Ex. Feb-Sunday School has 4 weeks and if the person attended
the second and fourth Sunday it would be 0101 or 5.

So it is possible to record attendance in MLS, but your time is probably better
spent elsewhere.

- Atticus

You say "we have been asked" in passive voice. Someone did the asking. It is possible that the individual who did the asking failed to consider that it might place an undue burden on the secretaries or clerks in question. I am sure that the brother (or sister) had the best of outcomes in mind, but the correct answer to this may be something like: "The Church does not provide a mechanism for reporting at the level you request. Perhaps we should talk about other ways of meeting the goal you have in mind."

kf7xm wrote:It is possible that the individual who did the asking failed to consider that it might place an undue burden on the secretaries or clerks in question.

The Church used to do monthly reporting. Then it was discontinued. Why?

Monthly = every 4 Sundays. Is that really a useful time period for the end goal desired?

kf7xm wrote:You say "we have been asked" in passive voice. Someone did the asking. It is possible that the individual who did the asking failed to consider that it might place an undue burden on the secretaries or clerks in question. I am sure that the brother (or sister) had the best of outcomes in mind, but the correct answer to this may be something like: "The Church does not provide a mechanism for reporting at the level you request. Perhaps we should talk about other ways of meeting the goal you have in mind."

That is a good idea. Thanks for the advice.

RussellHltn wrote:The Church used to do monthly reporting. Then it was discontinued. Why?

Monthly = every 4 Sundays. Is that really a useful time period for the end goal desired?

My understanding is that monthly reporting is still expected, but the monthly report stops at the ward level for review by the Bishopric. Four of the monthly reports are forwarded on to the stake, and we call those the quarterly reports.

In our ward, we've been re-emphasizing the need to have the monthly report information done by the 5th of every month, and it's been a good way to keep all the secretaries "in the habit".

unixguy wrote:My understanding is that monthly reporting is still expected, but the monthly report stops at the ward level for review by the Bishopric.

That's within the Bishop's prerogative, but is it policy or bishop's request? And why did the church back off from Monthly reporting as policy? (What is currently the quarterly report was expected monthly)

I'm sure the church has a good reason for the change. While I don't know the details, I think it can be summed up as "Sometimes less is more".

Perhaps I am just naive, but if you are being asked to collect information that the Church leadership has not required, then you are not going to find the solution in the official software. Me, I would probably just rig up one or several spreadsheets. The Open Office software you received with MLS has a spreadsheet in it if you don't have any other access.

RussellHltn wrote:That's within the Bishop's prerogative, but is it policy or bishop's request? And why did the church back off from Monthly reporting as policy?

I think the change has to do with the fact that the Church is constantly growing by leaps and bounds. Not to mention the fact that monthly reporting was done by paper and not electronically, was it not?

Those two things alone added together probably started taking up more and more time to process those monthly reports, and definitely getting expensive in the cost of the paper and the space to store it, and the trees used to produce it, etc.

The Church is growing. Administrative changes are made. The Presiding Bishopric made the decision, and there it is.

Maybe you could print monthly rolls for each class, instead of every 3 or 4 months, and turn those into your stake. Sure it would waste paper, but it should give them the information they need if the bishops aren't staying on top of it.