WEB: Calendar & Events Options

Desired Requirements

Highlight MJCBY's public events on our website
All public events should be included before they appear in other communications channels, e.g., Monthly Newsletter, E-blasts, social media
Event descriptions should be complete and visually attractive - this requires some other "events/calendar solution" other than Google Calendar (GC) for display on the website
The GC includes all public and internal events
The approach should be easy to maintain

This requires using the WordPress (WP) Events Aggregator to automatically import events
There are concerns with this approach

Updates from the GC may overwrite previously edited events in WP
When events get rescheduled in GC, the aggregator might not update the WP event and create a new event
Because of the manual effort to continuously verify the WP Events against the GC, this option should be dismissed
All imported events would need to be manually updated
Recurring events in GC become individual events in WP, so no global changes are possible

All public events would be created as WP Events and all internal events would be created in GC
The WP Events Aggregator does not export events so there is no way to automatically populate the Google Calendar with WP Events; therefore, having all events in GC would require this to be a manual operation (duplication of effort - not recommended)
Since most public events occur outside of business hours, there would seem to be little opportunity for facilities conflicts between public and internal business meetings
If this is a real concern, it would require consulting the Events list & Google Calendar for that day to be sure there is no conflict before any public or internal event was scheduled

Many if the public events are currently created in ShulCloud because of its features for registration and charging fees
Using SCC on our public site would require that all events be created there, not only the events that require registration or fees
The SCC has a rich set of features (e.g., Hebrew dates, Jewish holidays) that make it an attractive alternative to the WP Events feature
This approach would require displaying the SCC as shown in Figure 1.
The ShulCloud display can be modified to more closely resemble the WP site (e.g., same menu entries, same or similar header as the website, but it will look different, which might be very confusing to our site visitors
A benefit of this approach is that for members who are logged in to their ShulCloud accounts while using the webstie, the calendar that they see will include the family events (e.g., birthdays, yahrzeits) from their profile. If they are not logged in or are not members, they'll only see the public events

Option	Pros	Cons
Option 1: Google Calendar First	All events will be in GC Using Event Aggregator to import events automatically	Event Aggregator will not be able to import changes reliably, requiring manual verification All imported events will require manual editing to add graphics and make any other additions not in the GC entry Once recurring events are imported, they become individual events, so global changes must be made manually for each entry
Option 2: WP Events/Calendar Separate from GC	Easy to create events Flexibility for how events are displayed	If public events are also in GC, they will have to be entered manually
Option 3: ShulCloud Calendar	Many events are already created in ShulCloud SCC has many features not available in WP	If public events are also in GC, they will have to be entered manually Appearance will be different than the WP website

Option 2: WP Events & GC are separate.

Rationale:

Option 1 is too problematic with continuing need to verify WP Events due to improper imports
It is questionable how often public and private events interfere with each other in terms of facility utilization - this can be mitigated through checking the calendars before creating new events
Option 2 offers ease of use and best able to achieve the desired requirements
Option 3 offers interesting additional features but the look and feel of the ShulCloud display will be confusing

Need a process to ensure that all public events are captured before they appear in other channels
Establish standards for how events are displayed in Newsletter and E-blasts