I would like to track data on each of our 33 alumni chapters in Raiser's Edge.  However, I am facing some resistance and need to "sell" this idea.  My proposal includes: 1) setting up a record for each chapter with a constituency code of 'Alumni Chapter' and 2) assigning 'No valid address' and appropriate solicit codes to prevent the records from being pulled in mailings.  This would allow us to track the history of chapter presidents, chapter events and chapter awards--all in one place!  To me, this is a 'no brainer' as I have used "dummy" records in the past with no problem.  However, can anyone out there "back me up?"

Hi Jennifer

We do exactly the same for Alumni Groups, works really well and our Alumni Relations team are very happy with the flexibility that doing it this way gives them.

We also set up Organisation records for our Scholarships so that we can link donors and recipients, works very well.

 If you need any more information to try and impress the idea upon the management let me know and I'll be happy to go into more detail.

Thanks

Peter 

Thank you for sharing, Peter!  Raiser's Edge is such a powerful tool.  Therefore, I am such an advocate for utilizing its ability to efficiently track and store as much of our data as possible in one place.  I will share your response with "the powers that be" here at UD!  Again, thank you!

 Jennifer

I have not been using Raiser's Edge very long so forgive me if this is a roundabout way of doing things...but would it also work to set up membership in the chapter as a constituent attribute as well as positions held?  Then you could query on constituents with that attribute to get your information?   

Maureen 

Hi

This is what we are currently implementing - I think it is the only way to go. We will attach our chapter members as individual relationships, and have created a specific contact type to indicate the primary contact.

We yhen use address sharing options to ensure we send postal mail to the primary contact at their preferred address.

It is starting to work well.

regards Ros

I agree with you using constituency codes to track your constituents!  Also, to ensure that specific records are not pulled into the mailings, using the solicit codes to gather exclusions is definitely the better way to go.