Scouting Registration Tracking

[jwbohrer]

So here is our challenge. Scouting—both Cub and Boy—leaders are not always registered and up to date. We are trying to figure out a way to track that for our Stake leaders in LCR or LDSTools. We’d then be able to quickly look at that list and cross-reference it against the information that the Scout Office says.

There are a couple of options that I’ve considered but they both seem to be imperfect:

Option 1 is for the Stake YM President and Stake Primary Presidents to create a custom list in LDSTools. Since custom lists can’t be shared with read/write access across users, this option means that each of them would have to visit all Ward and Branch pages in LDS Tools and add them to the custom list, and there would be no automatic updating. This would really only work for “one-off” comparisons of Church/Scout Office lists and would not dynamically update. This option doesn’t really offer any advantages over the status quo.

Option 2 would be to poll that same data initially and then enter it into a Google spreadsheet and share it with the Ward Clerks and Stake Leaders. It would require the Ward Clerks to not just update their own calling data, but also the Google spreadsheet.

However, Option 3 seems to offer a potential solution, but I don’t know enough about it to be sure so I wanted to check here. It would start with the Stake creating a new category of “Custom Callings” called “Scouting”. I know that’s possible, but here’s what I don’t know. For a custom Stake calling, can a Ward Clerk designate someone for that calling? So when Brother Jones is called as a Scoutmaster, the Ward Clerk could enter him as Scoutmaster in the Ward Young Men organization, but could he also enter him as a Scoutmaster in the Stake Custom Callings: Scouting category? Or would the Stake Clerk have to enter him in the Custom Calling section? Either way would work, its just one more calling for the Ward clerk to enter if they can be granted permission to add to it so I would prefer that solution. If only the Stake Clerk can enter custom callings, then it would require a little bit more communications between the Wards and Stake but we already do it for Stake Youth Advisory Committee’s and such.

That option seems to be most useful since it remains within LCR/LDS Tools, and would be as dynamic as any other data in LCR is—just reliant upon Clerks entering the data.

Let me know if I’m missing anything or any better potential options.

Thanks!

[russellhltn]

For a custom Stake calling, can a Ward Clerk designate someone for that calling?

I highly doubt it.

[lajackson]

Option 3 . . . would start with the Stake creating a new category of “Custom Callings” called “Scouting”. I know that’s possible, but here’s what I don’t know. For a custom Stake calling, can a Ward Clerk designate someone for that calling?

I do not believe so. In this option, each ward also would need to create a custom calling for that ward, and you would be back to having to search each unit to get the information you needed. That information, of course, would already be available through the standard Scouting callings.

[russellhltn]

I highly doubt it.

Just to be clear - I can't think of a single instance when a ward has been able to record a stake calling. They can fill a ward calling that requires stake approval (such as the first counselor in the bishopric), but that's not the same thing.

In the old days before the systems would talk to each other, wards would create custom callings for members serving in the stake - just to record what members already had callings. But as lajackson points out, that's not going to help.