Coding Parent Grad Years

Mary Chase

Hello! I'm wondering if anyone has used one of the suffix fields for capturing parent grad years. For example: “P'22” (if they are a parent of a 2022 graduate) or “P'22, ‘26” (for parents with 2 graduating students in diff. years). I’m currently using attribute codes to capture this information. Thank you!

Joe Moretti

@Mary Chase I am very big on everything has it's place and the suffix field is not an ideal place for this. Using attributes is more the way to go.

Tina Pappas

@Joe Moretti I second this. Our org used the suffix field for many years (with grandparents, too). Data got messy and the clean up was tedious. We now use attributes to indicate class years.

Mary Chase

@Joe Moretti Thank you Joe and Tina. My thought was to avoid having to concatenate columns after exporting names to excel. If a suffix field was used, it could be configured into an Add/Sal. Any additional thoughts?

Joe Moretti

@Mary Chase Concatenate the columns after the export. Having a completely messy Addressee/Salutation is a nightmare, which most database managers can agree on. They are a mess when using it properly, thrown in a class year, it is a nightmare. I have had to clean up way too many addressee/salutation tables in my work life and fun it is not. Keep items in their proper place.

Christine Cooke

@Mary Chase Yep Yep keep it in Constit Attributes and concatenate if you gotta have it with their name(s). To throw another wrench in your idea - what are you gonna do if they have more than two kids? Or they have a true suffix and 4 kids that have or are attending? Nope.

And if you are doing any lists or reporting based on year, you are not going to be able to pull on suffix in some cases and if you can there will be several extra hoops to jump through.

Keep it clean.

Karen Stuhlfeier

@Mary Chase I don't code it. You can query on it using their relationship with their child. You can find or export the class year of their children easily if they're all related properly.

La Donna Borth

@Mary Chase I agree with the consensus of not using suffix fields for other information. If you really need a code somewhere, then Constituent code of Alum Parent, with the details you are already putting in an attribute would supply a decent code for queries.

Sherry Aldrich

@Mary Chase I'm a believer of using the fields as they were made to be used. So suffix should be suffix. We don't capture parent years. If I wanted to, though I would use the student relationship and the class year of the student.

Thanks

Sherry