When the COVID-19 pandemic forced the closure of missionary training centers worldwide in March 2020, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints transitioned its training of new missionaries to online instruction often referred to as “home MTC.”

The online training originated from the Church’s 10 MTCs worldwide, with missionaries meeting their companions, instructors and other new missionaries in classroom groups or “districts.”

With MTCs resuming on-site training, most new missionaries will begin their training online at home for a third of their training, then travel to an MTC for the remaining two-thirds of their training. The phased approach allows missionaries to continue to experience many of the positive elements of online training that have been realized during the pandemic period of training new missionaries.

Here, companions Sister Audrey Morgenegg (from Knoxville, Tennessee, going to the Arizona Tucson Mission) and Sister Elizabeth Wheatley (from Jefferson, South Dakota, and going to the Louisiana Baton Rouge Mission) talk about transitioning from online training at home to on-site training at the Provo MTC.

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Sister Elizabeth Wheatley hugs her companion, Sister Audrey Morgenegg, as she arrives at the Provo Missionary Training Center and they meet for the first time in person in Provo on Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021.

Kristin Murphy, Deseret News

Sister Audrey Morgenegg and Sister Elizabeth Wheatley discuss a lesson during their first in-person class at the Provo Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021.

Kristin Murphy, Deseret News

Sisters Audrey Morgenegg and Elizabeth Wheatley hug was they walk to class at the Provo Missionary Training Center on Wednesday, Aug 25, 2021.

Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News