Troop Calendar visible by non-member parents

Discussions about the Calendar Tool at lds.org. Questions about the calendar on the classic site should be posted in the LUWS forum.
dwiltbank
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Troop Calendar visible by non-member parents

#1

Post by dwiltbank »

I would like to encourage the troops in our stake to use a ward troop calendar. This would allow members and ward leadership to see various upcoming events. This idea works great for member families. We have some troops that have populations that are up-to 25% non-members. How do these non-members view a ward troop calendar that requires an lds.org account?

As the stake YM counselor over scouting, I would like to add district and stake events on the ward troop calendars?
russellhltn
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#2

Post by russellhltn »

dwiltbank wrote:How do these non-members view a ward troop calendar that requires an lds.org account?

They can't. I don't know if that's being addressed or not.
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aebrown
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#3

Post by aebrown »

dwiltbank wrote:I How do these non-members view a ward troop calendar that requires an lds.org account?

Note that a nonmember can get an LDS Account, but it won't be helpful in this regard, since accessing the calendar requires not only an LDS Account, but one whose membership number is connected to the ward or stake that owns the calendar -- and a nonmember clearly can't configure their LDS Account that way.
dwiltbank wrote:As the stake YM counselor over scouting, I would like to add district and stake events on the ward troop calendars?

That is contrary to the underlying philosophy of the calendar; each ward maintains its ward calendars and the stake maintains stake calendars. Instead, you should create a stake calendar that has the stake and district events. That way there is only one calendar with these events (much easier to maintain) and members can choose to subscribe to that calendar if they'd like.
Questions that can benefit the larger community should be asked in a public forum, not a private message.
Gary_Miller
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#4

Post by Gary_Miller »

aebrown wrote: Instead, you should create a stake calendar that has the stake and district events. That way there is only one calendar with these events (much easier to maintain) and members can choose to subscribe to that calendar if they'd like.
This is what our stake did. It was quite easy since one of our Stake Tech guys is also our District Web master.
Gary_Miller
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#5

Post by Gary_Miller »

dwiltbank wrote:I would like to encourage the troops in our stake to use a ward troop calendar. This would allow members and ward leadership to see various upcoming events. This idea works great for member families.

In the intial calendar set up there is a default calendar for each AP Quorm, since scouting is the activity arm of the AP this is where the Young Men Quorm leaders should be posting there activities.
dwiltbank wrote:We have some troops that have populations that are up-to 25% non-members. How do these non-members view a ward troop calendar that requires an lds.org account?
The best way to do this is for the troops to each setup and maintain a Troop Web site that is linked to the district web site. They may even be able to link/sinc the church calendar to the web page. It could be one of the projects for a YM working on his Computer Meritbadge. There is also a postion call Troop Web Master.
failproof
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#6

Post by failproof »

Gary touched on something that might help. You could easily set up a Google calendar (or multiple calendars, assuming you want one for each unit, i.e. you might want separate calendars for your Scouts, Varsity Scouts and Venture Scouts) and then have each BSA unit sync the Google calendar with the related ward calendar and the related stake calendar(s). This then gives non-member scouts and their families somewhere to go to see the calendar that applies to them.
One thing to keep in mind, however, is that the sync only goes one way. Events added to the Google calendar will not sync to the LDS.org calendar.
russellhltn
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#7

Post by russellhltn »

failproof wrote:You could easily set up a Google calendar
While that's technically possible, I would check with local leaders. Having information about the troop's activities publicly available could be a security risk.

Handbook 2: 21.1.2 is quite strict on what is allowable, but is silent on what a troop can and cannot do.
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failproof
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#8

Post by failproof »

I completely agree. Please stay within church and scouting policies when it comes to using the web. There is some gray area about what may be allowed for scouts vs what is allowed for church, but ultimately for a church sponsored scout unit, the church still has authority to dictate some restrictions. My suggestion is to err on the side of caution and make every attempt to follow policy for both organizations.
Gary_Miller
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#9

Post by Gary_Miller »

Yes we should certainly stay within the church guidlines as well as BSA guidlines, as scouting is a church activity.

However I don't see it as a problem if you just follow the proper procedures as outlined in the handbooks.
tilaloz
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#10

Post by tilaloz »

I guess I find this answer not very satisfying.

First of all, the sync feature specifically tells me that I'm not to share the url and that is only for my personal use. Even if I ignored this, it automatically syncs all my subscribed calendars, I only want to share our Scouting calendar.

As for policy of running a google calendar for this, it isn't clear to me that sharing a non-public, non-searchable google calendar with a few scout families violates the Church-sponsored internet presence policy. It wouldn't be much different than emailing them a pdf of the calendar.

Gary_Miller's advice would work but defeats the purpose of having an integrated lds.org calendar. Now families have to go to 2 calendars to see what is going on. Not to mention the scheduling conflicts that can arise and the duplication of effort (lds.org to reserve resources and deconflict ward activity and troop website to show to families).

We were specifically encouraged by Bro. Beck to serve the community by inviting non-member families to participate in our scouting units. It seems like the calendar needs a share feature that meets that reality. Our Pack and EYO patrol or currently more than 50% non-LDS and is very challenging to have two calendaring systems.
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