Guiders Staff Room Part 3

I agree. But Guiding, and The Law will tell you that that is no excuse. You must have explicit (not implicit, inferred by you because they have contacted you) a parent's permission to store their contact details outside of GO on a personal device.

I have been on Region GDPR training today

@Heratnumber7 your phone will store the number unless you delete all incoming and outgoing messages which is a bit pointless.

I've not tried using email directly from Go but you can't send attachments can you? So again you'll have to use your computer - which saves recent addresses - and you'll get replies to your email address so you'll have their address anyway.

The app used by Scouts has been banned by Guiding. I suspect because they spent a lot of money developing GO.

As for this it's impossible to text or email parents without storing their number.

You need specific, opt in, permission from parents to store their number on your phone. We've got a record of all our parents' approval for this and we check at the start of every new year.

You can email parents directly from GO. You shouldn't store them on your pc.

It's all a PITA, and I suspect many Leaders ignore the rules. You'd be silly to trust a third party app though.

You can use Survey Monkey for voting buttons. Or EventBrite.

@Heratnumber7 well, it's impossible to text or email parents without storing their number.
But no, don't use another database.

Herat the app I was looking for sends texts and emails out to parents with voting buttons for "yes I can attend" and "no I can't". It then provides automatic summaries with the lists or yes and no to the administrator.

Was hoping that GO might do that too. I know the scouts/cubs/beavers in my area use a similar system. Maybe it's something that might be available in the future for GO.

Sorry, didn't mean to get off on the wrong foot here. Was just hoping to use whatever I am allowed to use to be as efficient as possible from day one! Of course I will be taking GDPR and safeguarding very seriously (I did mention that in my previous post).

Sorry. You CAN email from go.

What do you want to track?

No. But that doesn't mean you can use another system.
Guiding will take a very dim view and you will be contravening your duty of care to your girls. Possibly GDPR too as you cannot guarantee their personal data would be safe.

I haven't seen the GO system yet. Can you use it for text/email notifications and tracking?

DO NOT STORE CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION ANYWHERE ELSE BUT GO!!

Seriously, you have no idea how secure that system is.

Programming sounds serious !!!

Does anyone use an online account to keep parents details and manage communications?

I've found one called "Teamer" that is a free app in your phone. It records all members details and events and sends text and email notifications and collates responses. It also creates a website with space for blogs etc and a calendar listing all events. I've tested it out with some dummy data and it seems amazing!

It apparently also manages subs and processes the collection of subs if you link it to a bank account , but I'm a bit nervous about that.

Also slightly worried about storing all patents details on an online account. Only the leader can see the details but not sure from a GDPR point of view.

Programme planning needs a good spreadsheet!

There are rules about bank accounts - eg you need one that offers a dual mandate facility.

There is LOADS of information on the Guiding website, including a template to do your accounts. it's very helpful and you don't need a password.

Good luck, and thank you very much for volunteering.

Do the new programme online training, visitna couple of other units and remember to leave space for other activities.

Wow, congrats!

I have an email account dedicated to my unit. That means the other leaders can also access it without any compromise to my privacy. Its also easier to ignore emails if now isn't a good time! We (leaders) chat in a WhatsApp group.

Programme planning.... Remember less is more 😂 (I'm still learning that!) IF you've got time at the end, have a couple of games up your sleeve. Or colouring sheets.

And welcome

Hi everyone. Some of you helpfully responded to my other thread where I asked for advice about whether to become a rainbows leader.

The good news is that it looks like it's going to happen.

There are going to be three of us running it, two training for qualification (me and one other mum) and another qualified leader. The qualified leader has just moved to the area and is very motivated but confessed that she has never been the main leader before.

We're going to start properly mid January. (There are a couple of other local leaders filling in until Christmas but it's been a bit chaotic).

We already have loads of ideas about activities and about how we are going to run things more smoothly but I am really keen to get your tips on how to manage the admin/banking/communications side of it all.

We need it to be as easy as possible and I'm keen to embrace whatever technology I can to make it easy.

I'm grateful for any ideas you can throw at me!

Thank you

😂

Hello MTB. Welcome.

Yesterday I learnt that if you have cornflour gloop for a skill builder the YLs enjoy it more than the brownies. Also that if you substitute salt for play sand it's equally a bugger to get up off the floor!

Thank you, just catching up on this thread, it's lovely to see people with the same thoughts and issues and some amazing ideas on here too.

Welcome @MTBMummy

Hi, may I join in please? Relatively new (less than 12 months) Brownie leader.