Quarterly Report for new ward

We had a ward split this last Sunday which resulted in a new ward. We are wondering how the quarterly report should be filed for the new ward and the existing ward it was split from. Any help would be greatly appreciated

sherwinharris wrote:We had a ward split this last Sunday which resulted in a new ward. We are wondering how the quarterly report should be filed for the new ward and the existing ward it was split from. Any help would be greatly appreciated

Great timing -- a split in the middle of the last month of a quarter certainly raises some challenges for the quarterly report!

Here's what I would do:

• Sacrament meeting attendance: For each of the weeks prior to the split, both wards use the common attendance percentage; for the weeks after, each ward uses their own. And then they average those percentages to come up with the reported average
• For most of the other numbers, the denominator is determined by the actual membership of each ward as of June 30, and that can't be changed. You need to determine which of those people attended the meetings mentioned on a particular line. That may require some coordination with the previous organization secretaries, who might be in the other ward, but it can be done. For example, for YM, you need to decide which of the YM in your ward as of June 30 attended their meetings during June. The same with all the other organizations.
• Home (and Visiting) Teaching are pretty challenging, given the necessary overhaul of districts and companionships after a ward split, but still the principle is the same -- which of the households (or sisters) in the ward as of June 30 were visited in the month of June (which visit might have occurred before or after the split).

First question I have is does MLS allow creating a quarterly report for the new ward? If not, then that settles it right there. It might be worth a call to support to see what will happen.

aebrown wrote:Home (and Visiting) Teaching are pretty challenging, given the necessary overhaul of districts and companionships after a ward split, but still the principle is the same -- which of the households (or sisters) in the ward as of June 30 were visited in the month of June (which visit might have occurred before or after the split).

This could be really challenging. IIRC, MLS won't allow HT/VT visit data to be entered for a family in the month they move in. Maybe that's different on a "boundary realignment".

aebrown wrote:Sacrament meeting attendance: For each of the weeks prior to the split, both wards use the common attendance percentage; for the weeks after, each ward uses their own. And then they average those percentages to come up with the reported average

I thought Sacrament meeting attendance was a head count, not a percentage. Since this is tied to budget funds, I'd be leery of anything that boosts the head count by double-counting.

Personally, I'd average the total sacrament attendance of the two wards combined. That would be the number that needs to be reported. Use the average after the split to decide how the numbers would be split between the two. But that's just me. I'd think CHQ would have specific instructions for situations like this.

russellhltn wrote:

aebrown wrote:Sacrament meeting attendance: For each of the weeks prior to the split, both wards use the common attendance percentage; for the weeks after, each ward uses their own. And then they average those percentages to come up with the reported average

I thought Sacrament meeting attendance was a head count, not a percentage. Since this is tied to budget funds, I'd be leery of anything that boosts the head count by double-counting.

I guess I wasn't clear enough on the last step in my recommendation -- once you have the percentage as I described, apply it to the new count of members and submit that number. That should avoid any double counting (if both wards use that method).

Another way to look at that method (which yields the same result, but is probably more understandable) is to let each ward take its percentage of the attendees for the weeks before the split. If Ward A has 45% of the total members and Ward B has 55%, then for each of the pre-split weeks, Ward A takes 45% of the number of attendees in sacrament meeting. Then Ward A takes its accurate count for the post-split Sundays, and finally averages all those individual numbers. That gives the proper weight to each meeting, and gives each ward the appropriate share of the count for each pre-split week.

russellhltn wrote:

aebrown wrote:Home (and Visiting) Teaching are pretty challenging, given the necessary overhaul of districts and companionships after a ward split, but still the principle is the same -- which of the households (or sisters) in the ward as of June 30 were visited in the month of June (which visit might have occurred before or after the split).

This could be really challenging. IIRC, MLS won't allow HT/VT visit data to be entered for a family in the month they move in. Maybe that's different on a "boundary realignment".

But the quarterly report still allows the visit total to be entered. So if MLS won't allow the entry of individual visits, the visits might have to be tabulated manually. But the resulting total can certainly be entered.

aebrown wrote:But the quarterly report still allows the visit total to be entered. So if MLS won't allow the entry of individual visits, the visits might have to be tabulated manually. But the resulting total can certainly be entered.

But the number of families is calculated, correct? How does the quarterly report deal with mid-month move-ins? Is it the number of families at the end of the month, or is it the number of families at the end of the month who have been there the whole month?

If it's the latter, then you have zero families to HT - if there's a quarterly report at all.

I think we need to hear from someone from one of the "new unit a month" areas.

russellhltn wrote:But the number of families is calculated, correct? How does the quarterly report deal with mid-month move-ins? Is it the number of families at the end of the month, or is it the number of families at the end of the month who have been there the whole month?

All statistics are calculated at the end of the month, based on the membership as of the moment the month ends. There's no concept of having "been there the whole month."

If a family moves in at the end of the month, they are part of the denominator for home teaching. If a child turns 12 at the end of the month, they are part of the denominator for YM/YW. In both those scenarios, there might have been no opportunity to home teach, and there may not have even been a Sunday for the youth to attend meetings.

Most of the statistics are reported for numbers of people, not percentages, so it doesn't really matter what the denominator is. But the percentages are calculated and shown, and the percentages do have some impact on budget allowance (for the YSA and Primary portions of the budget allowance calculation).

russellhltn wrote:First question I have is does MLS allow creating a quarterly report for the new ward?

Yes, MLS will create a report for the new ward based on the membership records in the ward at the end of the quarter, if the new ward MLS is running and membership records have been transferred. If there is a delay in getting the new ward MLS going, and the former ward did in fact send out membership records, the new ward may need some help from LUS to generate the report. But it can be done.

The other suggestions aebrown made are the best method I know of to calculate the two new reports based on the timing of the division.

lajackson wrote:

russellhltn wrote:First question I have is does MLS allow creating a quarterly report for the new ward?

Yes, MLS will create a report for the new ward based on the membership records in the ward at the end of the quarter, if the new ward MLS is running and membership records have been transferred. If there is a delay in getting the new ward MLS going, and the former ward did in fact send out membership records, the new ward may need some help from LUS to generate the report. But it can be done.

MLS isn't involved in creating the baseline for the ward. There is a CMIS process that runs very early on the morning (in the unit's time zone) of the 1st day of the quarter to calculate the baseline for the previous quarter. Even if MLS hasn't been installed, the baseline will be generated if the ward exists. Once the baseline is sent from CMIS to MLS, the report is available in MLS for editing.