Attendance

When taking class attendance, say in RS or EQ, and the member has another calling and aren’t present in class, but they’re in their other calling, do you still mark them as present?

I do for EQ. If they are in a Primary or YM calling (including the bishop and his counselors, but not the clerks), I mark them as present for EQ meeting. I also mark the full time missionaries serving from our ward and members who are in stake callings that might take them out of the ward for Sunday meetings. I don't run around the church trying to find out if they are physically present each week - there isn't time for that.

mshouse01 wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 1:42 pm When taking class attendance, say in RS or EQ, and the member has another calling and aren’t present in class, but they’re in their other calling, do you still mark them as present?

Yes. Here are the instructions:

Using Class and Quorum Attendance in LCR or Member tools, record the number of Melchizedek Priesthood holders who attended at least one priesthood, Sunday School, or Primary meeting during the last month of the quarter either as a class member or while serving in a calling.

Our Sunday School secretary has been recording Gospel Doctrine attendance in LCR on the same page where I as EQ secretary record Priesthood attendance. Is this correct?

abarney1944 wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 8:15 pm Our Sunday School secretary has been recording Gospel Doctrine attendance in LCR on the same page where I as EQ secretary record Priesthood attendance. Is this correct?

Yes. You're both recording in the same place. Since they're held on different dates, there shouldn't be any conflict as long as care is taken.

Is there any way to post attendance for visitors, not members of our ward, to a class?

BarryAnderson wrote: Mon Mar 14, 2022 10:09 am Is there any way to post attendance for visitors, not members of our ward, to a class?

Not as of today. That feature is supposedly in the works though.

BarryAnderson wrote: Mon Mar 14, 2022 10:09 am Is there any way to post attendance for visitors, not members of our ward, to a class?

That is not yet available in the LCR Class and Quorum Attendance report.
The December 2021 revised General Handbook change in section 33.5.1.1, paragraph three, states:
"Sunday Quorum and Organization Meetings. Attendance is recorded each week by quorum and organization secretaries and advisers. Youth leaders may also assist in recording attendance. The count is the number attending the meeting in-person or by streaming, including visitors. Members who are serving in the Primary or as youth leaders within the ward are also included as attending. Members who are attending another ward are counted in the ward they attend." (Bold added for emphasis.)
Based on this change it is most likely to be an added reporting feature in the LCR report sometime in the future. Like most other programming changes we are not given a schedule as to when it will become available. For now I recommend manually recording those additional attendees somewhere and then adding them in to the LCR report when it is updated with that capability.

russellhltn wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 8:49 pm

abarney1944 wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 8:15 pm Our Sunday School secretary has been recording Gospel Doctrine attendance in LCR on the same page where I as EQ secretary record Priesthood attendance. Is this correct?

Yes. You're both recording in the same place. Since they're held on different dates, there shouldn't be any conflict as long as care is taken.

Occasionally care isn't taken and other organization secretaries uncheck other organization attendance. If I could ask a couple of questions:
1. Why doesn't each organization have its own attendance roll?
2. Is there any plans to separate attendance by the organization?
3. For curiosity's sake, since there is one attendance data table, I'm assuming, somewhere the Ward Clerk designates which calendar weeks are RS, MP, YM, and YW and which weeks were SS. Correct?

chuckgwilly wrote: Wed Dec 07, 2022 2:29 pm Occasionally care isn't taken and other organization secretaries uncheck other organization attendance. If I could ask a couple of questions:
1. Why doesn't each organization have its own attendance roll?
2. Is there any plans to separate attendance by the organization?
3. For curiosity's sake, since there is one attendance data table, I'm assuming, somewhere the Ward Clerk designates which calendar weeks are RS, MP, YM, and YW and which weeks were SS. Correct?

I'd imagine a lot of it has to do with keeping things simple. If you have separate tables, there's a possibility that they'll double up on one week and completely miss another.

While there's a template for which weeks are which, that's not necessarily consistent for every ward, every week in the entire church. Especially when you factor in 5th Sundays and Stake Conferences.

If you require someone to enter which week is which, everything gets jammed up if that person fails to carry out their responsibility.

No matter how you do it, there's ways it can go wrong. Once leadership understands that it's a shared calendar and to only worry about the weeks they meet and leave the others alone, it should work just fine.

I'm assuming, somewhere the Ward Clerk designates which calendar weeks are RS, MP, YM, and YW and which weeks were SS.

The First Presidency letter on Oct 6, 2018, was pretty clear about the 1st/3rd and 2nd/4th Sunday schedules, without any exceptions for Stake/General/Ward Conferences. Of course each local Stake has discretion, but I would expect that it's generally true that most units are following this and no clarification is needed. But perhaps exceptions are more common that what I'd expect...

One aspect I like is that the shared attendance calendar helps give a broader picture to individual organizations (and of course Bishoprics). So when the RS enters their attendance for sisters, they can also easily see the overall weekly attendance of those sisters. Given the fact that without a weekly class for the different orgs it can be difficult to identify trends, having this all presented together gives a better overall understanding of each member's attendance patterns.

BrianEdwards wrote: Fri Dec 09, 2022 8:56 am The First Presidency letter on Oct 6, 2018, was pretty clear about the 1st/3rd and 2nd/4th Sunday schedules, without any exceptions for Stake/General/Ward Conferences. Of course each local Stake has discretion, but I would expect that it's generally true that most units are following this and no clarification is needed. But perhaps exceptions are more common that what I'd expect...

True, but say it would be held without variation by the entire church seems a bit of a streach. And you still have those pesky 5th Sundays that are at the discression of the bishop.

Questions regarding General Handbook 33.5.1.1
1. Where can I go to see that dates of the adjustments below? Stating the revised date was December 2021 on the section below?
2. Does that mean Elder and Sister ???, who travels for 90 % of the time for their callings cannot be counted in our local ward attendance?
3. Does that mean that a full-time missionary including senior couple missionary from our ward cannot be included in our local ward attendance?
4. Does that mean that member who serve in the stake who attends another ward cannot be counted in our local attandance?
5. Prior to the visitor tab being available, didn’t all the scenarios attandance above use to count in their local ward? Or when did they not officially count?


33.5.1
Types of Reports
33.5.1.1
Attendance Reports
Attendance at sacrament meetings and Sunday priesthood and organization meetings is recorded electronically using LCR or Member Tools.

Sacrament Meeting. Attendance at sacrament meeting is recorded each week by the ward clerk or an assistant ward clerk. The count is the number attending the meeting in-person or by streaming, including visitors. Ward members who are not present because they have another assignment or are attending another ward are counted in the ward they attend.

Sunday Quorum and Organization Meetings. Attendance is recorded each week by quorum and organization secretaries and advisers. Youth leaders may also assist in recording attendance. The count is the number attending the meeting in-person or by streaming, including visitors. Members who are serving in the Primary or as youth leaders within the ward are also included as attending. Members who are attending another ward are counted in the ward they attend.

(1) I do not believe you'll be able to "track" individualized Handbook changes in the way you would like. For example, the Dec 2021 excerpt included in a previous post, is slightly different from the current (Oct 2023) Handbook language, but there's no way to go back and find previous iterations of the online Handbook and determine when or how often changes occurred in any particular section.

(2-4) I think the current Handbook language is quite clear that each of your scenarios does not permit counting them towards your local attendance, as they will (or at least should!) be counted as attending wherever they physically attend on any given Sunday (traveling somewhere, full-time missionaries somewhere, Stake assignment somewhere).

While it's often informative to try and figure out when things changed, with the sheer volume of changes the online Handbook receives, it may be best to simply try and ensure we're always aligned with current policy, instead of trying to determine at what point changes occurred and whether we previously were aligned or not.

As I recall, the rules for recording attendance were usually on the forms themselves, not so much in the Handbook.

russellhltn wrote: Tue Oct 03, 2023 1:30 pm As I recall, the rules for recording attendance were usually on the forms themselves, not so much in the Handbook.

Indeed the instructions for how to take attendance and who is to be counted as attending is at the top of the printed attendance sheets. For those using Member Tools to take or to record attendance and need a reminder of the instructions, the information is available directly from General Handbook, 33.5.1.1, by tapping the circled question mark at the top of the page and to the right of the form title. The information at the top of the printed attendance sheets reads the same as General Handbook, 33.5.1.1.