Meeting Attendance

Does anyone know of any "Meeting Attendance" web sites? What I am looking for is a way that our auxiliary secretaries can log onto the same web site and enter attendance weekly. Our Bishop likes to have a list every month of people who have not attended at least one time that month (not to mention this is asked in the Quarterly Report to CHQ). Although numbers are sent to CHQ, it would be great to have actual names for the Bishop to look at. I have found the "LDS Auxiliary Assistant" software, however it hasn't been updated for a couple of years and doesn't have a central database.

As ward clerk I don't want to have all of the secretaries having to schedule time on the ward computer to enter this into a spreadsheet or other program. I know that I could set up a spreadsheet that they could just e-mail to me, however after looking into the returnandreport.org and ymyw.org web sites I was wondering if there was something already set up for attendance.

pbhanney wrote:Does anyone know of any "Meeting Attendance" web sites? What I am looking for is a way that our auxiliary secretaries can log onto the same web site and enter attendance weekly. Our Bishop likes to have a list every month of people who have not attended at least one time that month (not to mention this is asked in the Quarterly Report to CHQ). Although numbers are sent to CHQ, it would be great to have actual names for the Bishop to look at. I have found the "LDS Auxiliary Assistant" software, however it hasn't been updated for a couple of years and doesn't have a central database.

As ward clerk I don't want to have all of the secretaries having to schedule time on the ward computer to enter this into a spreadsheet or other program. I know that I could set up a spreadsheet that they could just e-mail to me, however after looking into the returnandreport.org and ymyw.org web sites I was wondering if there was something already set up for attendance.

I don't know of any online or automatic way to do this.

But to me, this seems too complicated for a simple task. We just give the secrataries a new printed roll each month. Then they hand them back in at the end. All we do is count up the attendance, send the numbers on, and then put the rolls in the Bishop's box so that he can analyze the attendance himself as in-depth as desired.

Like mkmurray, I think a website is too complex a issue for a simple problem.

MLS out-of-the-box can print out the needed class/quorum rolls for a quarter at a time. (Nothing to prevent you from re-printing each month if desired.) It's a simple matter to take the sheet into the class and check it off or pass it around and tally things up at the end of the month.

I think the hassle of data entry would nix any computerized approach to the problem.

The problem is for the secretaties of the organizations who have to acquire all of that data and then give it to the ward clerk. Then the ward clerk has to compile all of the data into the computer in what we feel is less than effecient means.

It would be nicer if we could have a report on the screen that appeared to be the same as the rolls, but had checkboxes for us to be able to continually log the attendance in MLS. This would make it much easier to track trends, and would fill the final piece of being able to simply print out the entire quarterly reports when that time came.

heyring wrote:The problem is for the secretaties of the organizations who have to acquire all of that data and then give it to the ward clerk. Then the ward clerk has to compile all of the data into the computer in what we feel is less than effecient means.

It would be nicer if we could have a report on the screen that appeared to be the same as the rolls, but had checkboxes for us to be able to continually log the attendance in MLS. This would make it much easier to track trends, and would fill the final piece of being able to simply print out the entire quarterly reports when that time came.

It sounds to me that what you recommend would add more work than is currently required. The current process merely involves printing an attendance roll for the last month of the quarter, checking the name of an individual if they attend at least one meeting during that month, total the number and give that number to the clerk.

Continually tracking whether a member is in a meeting each week and inputing that into the computer compounds the entries into the computer and therefore the work load.

jdlessley wrote:It sounds to me that what you recommend would add more work than is currently required. The current process merely involves printing an attendance roll for the last month of the quarter, checking the name of an individual if they attend at least one meeting during that month, total the number and give that number to the clerk.

Continually tracking whether a member is in a meeting each week and inputing that into the computer compounds the entries into the computer and therefore the work load.

Well, the issue is that Church Headquarters only requires that minimal amount of data. It is merely a local decision by the stake or ward if any other attendance or trends are tracked beyond what the quarterly reports asks.