page: "02"
author: District Elder Wm King
summary: Zoom meeting summary
title: Technology as an extension

Technology as an extension

A look at the technology

To overcome many challenges Region 12 face with resources limitations, we should turn towards technology to help extend our reach.

Build a system for collaboration
Build a system for online learning
Build a system for reporting
Build a system for finance and church management

That means as a Region we will need to rethink how we approach outreach, managing our churches and train our members.

We can build SHARED SYSTEMS such as:

Linked data and communication system can link the church reporting system to the District Elder's reports and so forth. Example

How many baptized is reported in the churches Baptismal register. The resulting number is used by for example a Pastor's report.
How many people tarried and received the Holy Ghost is logged into a register (HG register). The resulting totals also go on the Pastor's report.
District Elder's can respond to the State Bishop's request about the status of churches in his district.
As a Pastor manages his church through the software, the information entered can be used by the Pastor and others to determine strategies to help the ministry grow.
There are a number of systems we can add to the website for communications.

Build a Communications system to overcome gaps where individuals who have no connection to the east coast or get who get their information late or not at all will appreciate having website where they get the same information everyone else gets, in real-time.

Scenario: Our Regional Apostle is at the national. Pastors are waiting in anticipation for some news which is shared by Bishop Fields on his cellphone in one place, the website. Pastors can communicate with one another, share information with one another and so forth.
Internal mail system where messages can be sent in-house.
Notifications and alerts can be built into the system.

Online training, learn anytime anywhere; Everybody will get the same teaching.

New comers training course
Ministers training and catechism
Bible class
Sunday School

We can build a shared library or material repository to upload and download things we need for the ministry.

Region 12 members who are writers can create content for Sunday School all ages, Bible Study group material, outreach tracks, music tracks for church services, guide books for Jr. Deacons, Ushers, and etc.

We can build a reporting system.

As auxiliaries fill out data through the church management system, the data becomes available to reports for the Pastor, District Elder, State Bishop, etc reports.
We can take all the reports online and build a reporting system around it.
Attach a online payment system to it, like PayPal and allow for example, a trainee to deposit money into their account, to pay for their credential in time for the National Convention.
What the reporting system will reveal is that the church and it auxiliaries are the foundation of the District, State and Region. Without the church and its data, we have no reporting system. Which means the only way we are going to be able to successfully build a working system, that everyone feels safe using, is that everyone who uses a section of the site needs to be involved.

Creating a technology group

We need to assemble a team. You can click on the names to read their job descriptions.

Additional needs:

Domain name registration/purchase.
Web hosting service (server rental).
Free GitLab account for resource management and version control.
Instructions for developers
Instructions for using GitLab for communication and collaboration.
Instructions for using GitLab for documentation and planning.
Writers for the website.

Creating a online presence

Here are some examples of things we can do:

Church profile page:

The purpose of the profile page is to:

To help people who plan to move in the area locate your church
Helps communicate your vision to like minded people.
People who live at a great distance from the church can participate.

What can it show?

Information about the ministry and the services it provides to the community.
Vision statement of the ministry
Event calendar.
Access to downloadable content, etc.

idea:

The page provides to the viewer enough information about that ministry they can make an informed decision about being part of the work.

Missionary department page:

Because a majority of our data comes to the Region from churches, we will most likely start projects at the church level.

How would we build permissions to restrict others from this?

Permissions example

Create a new content type called Missionary or some agreed upon name.
Create a new role called missionary
Grant the role missionary permissions to use the content type form called Missionary.
Remove all other permissions. This will give only people with the role missionary access to view, create, edit and use any content created by that form.

Tip

The page provides to the viewer an overview/dashboard of the missionary department statewide and can be sub-divided to have a dashboard for the State, District and Church.

Event calendar
Downloadable content
Training schedules
Vision statement, etc.

Content types

In Drupal, content types are a set of fields for a particular type of data.

Fields are those things you interact with on a web site when filling out a form.

For example. I want to collect information about a Baptismal candidate. I can create a field called Full name.

The database will store the full name of the person into a column name full_name. Because its in a database, other forms we create has access to the full_name, so we don't have to collect it again.

If the candidate is tarrying for the Holy Ghost, there name, already being in the system, can be used on that form. As the person progresses through the new comers classes, and etc we never have to collect their name again, we simply attach other pieces of content to person.

A group of fields will make up a form. A form could be one of these.

Pastors report
Weekly finance report
Sunday School attendance report
New comers attendance report
Registration to become a missionary
Registration to become a minister
Registration to become a deacon
Registration to join a church