Youth Quorum Access to Class Members list

Recently we have been training and encouraging the youth leaders to use Member Tools and the Gospel Library app. It came to our attention that the quorum presidents did not seem to have access to the list of class members. Is this a limitation of the app? or is something setup wrong?

I found it odd that as an Advisor to the actual Quorum President, that I had access, but he did not. I am not sure if there is some technical legal issue with the fact that I am an adult, and he is not, but he is the class President and not I. I am assuming there is a role, or something not set correctly but no one seems to really know. Is it possible for the Teachers Quorum President(cy) to have access to class list?

This would make it much easier for them to be proactive in reaching out to less active members of the ward without having to wait on an adult leader to send them the information. We have printed out lists before, which also seems odd we can print and give them a list which they tend to lose, but they cannot access that same list information on their own smartphones.

If this is just a limitation in the app itself, how do we get this enhanced to help our youth Presidencies feel more ownership by having direct access to the resources as opposed to needing to go to the advisor for the basics?

Rictersmith wrote: Tue May 03, 2022 4:35 pm I am not sure if there is some technical legal issue with the fact that I am an adult, and he is not, but he is the class President and not I. I am assuming there is a role, or something not set correctly but no one seems to really know. Is it possible for the Teachers Quorum President(cy) to have access to class list?

The roles and settings are determined by those priesthood leaders who tell the developers how the software is to work. Nothing is wrong with your (or his) settings.

In my opinion, it is a legal issue. I do not know this and I have not seen anything from the Church. I only read between the lines as the Church works to protect the youth.

I am familiar with laws in the United States that govern Internet sites and how they are allowed to interface with young people. There are also data protection and privacy issues here and around the world. The laws are not conducive with helping youth leaders be successful in their callings.

And so it seems to me that the best the Church is able to do at the moment is to allow trusted adult leaders to share the information with a young quorum president and his counselors to help them succeed in their callings.

Again, this is my own personal opinion. I have no official knowledge in the matter. That said, there is nothing to keep anyone from sending Feedback through the app requesting a change. But it is my experience that many have made that request and still there has been no resulting change in the direction given to the programmers. Another approach is for a bishop to raise the matter with the stake president, who meets regularly with an Area Seventy who is able to elevate the request.

Great feedback and thanks for sharing, especially how it might get escalated to get an improvement.

To me the strange part is that they can go and look up those numbers a bit more painfully in the ward listing (at least I don't think they are blocked from that), BUT they have to know who they are looking for. So, it's like they need to jump through the hoop of being handed a class attendance sheet. Then use the attendance sheet to look up each family and call those families, which is literally how we did it 30 years ago when it all was just on paper in a drawer under our old telephone.

It would be good to understand if this is or can be put on the road map for improving the application, or if there really is a legal roadblock. Like there should be a listing of the feedback\Enhancement requests and then the product managers decision\response.

Rictersmith wrote: Tue May 03, 2022 10:08 pm To me the strange part is that they can go and look up those numbers a bit more painfully in the ward listing (at least I don't think they are blocked from that), BUT they have to know who they are looking for. So, it's like they need to jump through the hoop of being handed a class attendance sheet. Then use the attendance sheet to look up each family and call those families, which is literally how we did it 30 years ago when it all was just on paper in a drawer under our old telephone.

While that certainly appears strange, I think you'll see a difference when it comes to members or families who have set their privacy settings to "Leadership only". I think you'll find the quorum presidents can't see the name in the ward listing. Since the quorum president isn't allowed to see those people, any class listing would be incomplete.

As for why the quorum president isn't considered as "leader", I'd imagine that's where the legal stuff along with the duties as spelled out in the Handbook comes into play. Note that the adult Sunday School teachers are in the same situation. They don't have a class listing either.

Unless I'm misreading things, I do notice that in all quorum presidency meetings there should be an adult who does have a class list. As such, I'd think the presidency is able to function.

I would agree and could understand if the member did mark leadership only. That seems reasonable, especially since most people are probably not conditioned to recognize the youth presidents as the actual quorum presidents and more like a 'class' president with the adult leader being the real leader in the room.

I would say just update the wording to "Adult Leadership Only" in the privacy settings to make cohesive and clear. Or even give the members the option to allow their youth to be listed for quorum presidencies to see as well or to remain visible only to the adult leadership level. This would probably have more real compliance with the spirit of personal privacy, then the path many are probably taking, which is the path of least resistance, and just printing out the list and giving it to the youth to use, which includes listings that are set to private unless some leader actually goes and marks the info out.

I did provide the feedback in the app as suggested. I'll follow up with the Bishopric and the YM leaders so that they are at least aware. I don't know if they will escalate, I get the feeling there is some level of fear in escalating concerns in general. It might be advisable for a top-down request and encouragement of the leaders to provide meaningful feedback to make it function more smoothly. This may already be happening, but at least from the responses I got initially from the leadership was that this specific issue has always been like this as far as they knew, and no one knew why or if there was even a route to request a change. It seemed totally foreign for me to suggest we create an ER for it. I came back to these forums to search if it had already been discussed, but I could not find anything in the results.

I wasn't aware of this issue until we were in Ward Youth Council and the class presidents let me know that they didn't have access to the class lists, namely the people that we were talking about in council. One astute dad who is also the Stake YM pres, had done screen shots for his kids who are in the youth leadership. This was a great work around. However, I think it would be reasonable to allow at least the youth class presidents to have access to their own class lists so that they can do their calling. I guess in the mean time, we will continue to do screen shots and text them to the youth leaders.

We would love to see youth leaders have access to their class/quorums. The youth class secretaries should have access to record attendance in the app since that is one of their responsibilities according to the handbook.

The youth class secretaries should have access to record attendance in the app since that is one of their responsibilities according to the handbook.

For clarity, the Handbook currently states that A.P. quorum secretaries are to help the ward clerk or quorum adviser keep track of attendance (GHB 10.4.2). So entering the data themselves into LCR (or the Tools App) is not a requirement, although of course it would be handy if they could do it!

As stated above we don't know for certain if the current implementation is due to privacy issues (most likely imho) or if it's just something that hasn't been done yet. Since it appears unlikely to change in the near future, the various methods we all employ to have adults provide the youth leaders with member info, are likely the best option.

Another reference for recording attendance is 33.5.1.1. "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."