According to the Class Absences section of the Albion College student handbook, aside from specified class absences, faculty have sole discretion over excused absences and makeup work.
As students juggle illness, academics and being leaders within their communities, the consequences of attendance policies come into question.
Attendance in a Post-Pandemic Classroom
Since the pandemic ended, assistant professor of women’s, gender and sexuality studies and ethnic studies Lucia Soriano said, “just purely getting students to come to class has been a big hurdle.”
Soriano added that while she considers class attendance a signifier of success in the workplace, she understands “that things will happen.”
“You will get sick, or maybe you don’t feel like talking that day. At the end of the term, I’m going to take all of this into consideration for your grade, so that you’re not failing purely because of your attendance,” Soriano said.
Assistant professor of history Christopher Riedel said he’s adapted to the drop in attendance by using technology to keep students engaged.
When a student had COVID this semester, he turned on a camera so they could watch remotely, counting that as attendance.
“That way, they didn’t have to do a whole bunch of makeup work,” Riedel said.
Islamabad, Pakistan sophomore Maryam Sohail said when she encountered an illness while on campus, she missed class without notifying the professor.
“Apparently that day we had a quiz as well, but thankfully the professor let me retake it,” Sohail said. “In that way, professors are understanding.”
To accommodate sick students, assistant professor of earth and environment Madeline Marshall records all of her classes.
“Students can actually just watch the recording of class later on to kind of be able to experience the exact same information that everyone who is in person got,” Marshall said.
Religious Studies professor Ron Mourad said he has noticed “a lot more lateness kind of across the board,” but he doesn’t consider it an absence.
Mourad added that it’s “perhaps related to a conversation about what’s changed since the pandemic.”
The Case for Mandatory Attendance
Columbia University outlines a strict approach to attendance, stating that, “attendance in all class meetings, laboratory periods and other required events for a course is a basic expectation of all students enrolled in the course, whether or not attendance is noted as a requirement on a course syllabus.”
Soriano said stricter policies could encourage attendance, but may not guarantee engagement.
“Most professors would like to believe that a stricter policy or expectation will force students to come to class,” Soriano said. “I think there’s a false sense of believing that a stricter policy will equal students’ interests or even their overall learning in the class.”
Antioch, Illinois junior Annika Lindstrom said mandatory attendance, “is the most direct way to encourage students to come to class,” and to her “it makes sense that it would be part of the grading scale.”
Riedel said while he doesn’t believe in mandatory attendance, he’s observed a strong correlation between attendance and academic performance.
“The students who don’t come do worse,” Riedel said. “The students who don’t come tend to have other problems where they don’t turn in assignments.”
A meta-analysis published by Macmillan Learning found that “attendance positively affects both course grades and GPA and is the single strongest predictor of college grades.”
Mourad said he thinks mandatory attendance improves student performance because “otherwise, why would we have classes in the first place?”
“By being present and participating and discussing the material with other students and with me, you would master the material more fully,” Mourad said.
For professor of economics and management Vicki Baker, mandatory attendance helps students invest in their future.
“A lot of students are taking out loans and paying a lot of money, or their loved ones are taking out loans,” Baker said. “I just think it’s important for them to be there, to be successful, to start building those behaviors that are going to be required of them when they go to work.”
The Line Between Consistency, Change
Mourad said he would revise his attendance policy if it was “not achieving its intended goal” or if “required to change it by college wide policy.”
Riedel said for him, it would take “solid pedagogical evidence from studies that there was a significantly better way of doing things.”
However, Riedel added if he could adjust anything, it would be “a way to make my policy clearer to people on the first day.”
Baker said while she has “zero intention of changing my policy now,” a shift in student culture would inspire her to make changes.
Baker added that in exchange for her students attending class every day, she puts in the same amount of effort.
“If I’m going to expect those behaviors to my students, I model them as well,” Baker said. “I’ve done my work, I’m prepared to deliver the lectures, I’m prepared to engage in the activities.”
Sohail said professors shouldn’t change their policies except on the basis of one factor:
“Everyone has a life outside of a classroom as well, and sometimes people are juggling with a lot of stuff,” Sohail said. “In that way, we need to be humans before we are students.”
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