Someone asks how many people came to last spring’s Saturday family workshop, or which docent led the March school tours. You open the program calendar in Altru, click back a few months, and the slots you remember aren’t there. The calendar looks empty for dates that were fully booked.
This trips up a lot of administrators, and it usually doesn’t mean anything was deleted. The calendar view in the programs area is built for scheduling and selling what’s coming up, not for looking back. The past program events and their sales history are still in the database. You just need a different way to reach them.
Why the calendar seems to skip the past
The program calendar is a working tool for staff who schedule capacity and sell admission. Showing past events there adds clutter that schedulers don’t need, so in many setups the calendar focuses on current and future dates. Depending on your Altru version, your security role, and any filters that are set on the view, past dates may show as blank or may not be reachable at all.
We can’t say with certainty how every Altru database behaves here, because filter options and defaults have changed over time. Before you assume the data is gone, do two quick checks:
- Look at the filters on the calendar view. If there is a date range, status, or program filter, widen it and see whether older events appear.
- Try with an administrator account. If an admin can see past events and your desk staff can’t, the difference is a security setting, not missing data.
If neither changes anything, treat the calendar as a forward-looking view and use one of the approaches below for history. If you need a definite answer about whether your version can show past dates in calendar form, Blackbaud support can confirm it for your specific build.
Better ways to see past program events
Open the program itself
Each program record holds its own scheduled events. Going to the program, rather than the calendar, generally gives you a list of its events that you can review, including ones that have already happened. This is the quickest route when the question is about a single program, such as “how many sessions of the summer camp ran last year?”
Build a query on program events
For anything broader, a query is the most reliable answer. Create an ad-hoc query using the program event source view and add the fields you care about: program name, event date, start time, capacity, and sold or attended counts if they are available in your view. Then filter on event date for the period you want.
A few tips that save time:
- Sort by date and program so the results read like a calendar in list form.
- Save the query with a date filter you can change, so next quarter you only update the range instead of rebuilding it.
- Export to Excel if someone wants to see it laid out by week or month. A pivot table by date and program gets you close to a calendar grid in a few minutes.
- Check field availability in a sandbox or test query first if you aren’t sure a field like attendance exists in your source view. Field names vary, and it is better to find out before you promise a report.
Use the reports you already have
Altru’s standard sales and program reports are run for a date range, and that range can be in the past. If the real question is “what did we sell” or “how full was it,” a sales report for the program and dates in question often answers it faster than any calendar would. Daily sales and advance sales activity is tied to the event that was purchased, so revenue history follows the event even after its date has passed.
Look at the constituent record
When the question is about one person or one school group, start with their constituent record. Their purchase and attendance history will show the past program events they bought, which is often all anyone needed to know.
Make this easier for the next person
Once you’ve found a method that works, save it where staff can find it. A shared query named something obvious, such as “Past program events by date,” prevents the same calendar confusion from recurring every time a manager asks about last year. A short note in your internal training docs explaining that the program calendar is for upcoming scheduling, and the query is for history, will save new staff a lot of clicking.
It’s also worth deciding which numbers count as the official record. If the education team quotes attendance from the query and finance quotes revenue from a sales report, agree on which source answers which question so the figures don’t seem to contradict each other.
Quick answers
Were my past events deleted?
Almost certainly not. Past program events and their sales stay in Altru. The calendar view simply isn’t the best place to see them.
Can I print a calendar of last year’s programs?
Not directly from the calendar in most cases. Run a query or report for the date range and lay it out by week or month in Excel.
Who can tell me for sure what my version supports?
Blackbaud support, or a quick test in your sandbox environment if you have one, will tell you whether your calendar view can be filtered to past dates.
