BuddyPress.org

There is no built-in way at the moment, but there are efforts to do so in the future.
More info:

New Plugin Adds Taxonomies to BuddyPress Groups

@evilben,

go to dashboard > users > profile fields.
Required field on registration form should be added to the NAME field group.
There is a date field type for birthdates. Set it to required, viewable by everyone

For the TOS read here

Another solution here (not tested)

Hi @yamaryam,

What is recommended ? No clue ! Don’t make mistake ? Don’t forget the milk bottle ? 😉

The theory

1) install / configure WordPress
2) activate 2014 theme
3) checking every thing is ok
4) activate network
5) checking every thing is ok
6) install / configure BuddyPress
7) checking every thing is ok
8) enjoy your dashboard: one for the main site and one for the network
9) don’t forget the milk bottle

Headache ?

@ayatango,

golden rule: never change a core file.

If you want to customize things you should use a child theme. And to ad/remove or modify core functions, you should use your child theme’s functions.php or bp-custom.php

In create.php are 18 hooks you can use to add some custom explanation !
In your case, you may hook into do_action( 'bp_before_group_details_creation_step' );

https://codex.wordpress.org/Child_Themes

BP Theme Compatibility and the WordPress Default Themes

functions.php

https://codex.buddypress.org/plugindev/bp-custom-php/

Understanding Action Hooks In WordPress

@thatmtnman

Is that correct? YES !

The rest of your topic, even if respectable, is a bit due to your inhabitude of BP i guess. And probably also of some WP usage around pages.
You can create as many pages as you want with WP. The difference between a page and post in WP is tiny, but very important. Both are post, but not with the same type ($post_type->post and $post_type->page). All this is detailled on the WP Codex.

BuddyPress is a plugin and use his component pages only for internal puprpose – because WP need them to work with BP… and conversely!

BP is shipped with some widgets, including a member’s widget with 3 filters letting you do exactly what you discribe.

For other custom use of buddypress, you can search for dedicated buddypress plugins on the plugin repo.

@alishaescoto,

instead of struggling with custom roles, i would consider to use one or more private groups for the rescue group. With this setting, you even don’t need two types of members.

And somehow, the memberslist of a private group can than be hidden with some extra adjustment.

BuddyPress Components and Features

Hi @flaviamelo

BuddyPress doesn’t have a Login_Helper class or a change_buddypress_avatar method. Which plugins are you using? This is 99.99% likely to be due to one of them.