As anyone who has ever listened to a lecture on the first day of class or glanced at a syllabus knows, according to University regulations, teachers in 100 and 200 level courses “must keep a record of attendance.” I get it, they want to help the new kids adjust and try to keep them from going wild. It’s an admirable goal. However, I am noticing in my classes and hearing friends and classmates complaining about mandatory attendance in 300 and 400 level classes as well.

I understand that professors in 100 and 200 level courses can’t help University regulations, but this trend towards universal mandatory attendance is rather alarming and I wanted to provide the flip side and present the negatives of mandatory attendance.

I think it’s important to note that contrary to what appears to be the prevailing belief of University staff, it is not necessarily a bad thing for someone to miss class. Sometimes there really are more important things than a lecture, especially if the student in question is keeping up with coursework and makes the rational decision that something else they need to do is more important, as is often the case. 

Also, and most obviously, having attendance be mandatory means there are a lot of people in the room that really don’t want to be there, for whatever reason. These people are just there to keep themselves from losing points on a final grade so I can’t get mad that they are there, but that person will invariably be texting, Facebooking, chatting or doing a Sudoku and whether or not they mean to, they will be distracting people who actually need to be there.

Admit it, we have all had those classes where we walked in the first day and knew that if the teacher would just pass out the final exam we’d be happy to take it, receive our well-earned A, and call it a semester. But everyone is different and someone else in that same class might need to sit and focus carefully without having someone who is assigned to sit next to them (as compulsory attendance policies often leads to elementary school-type seating charts) always distracting them.

We all have or have had miserable mandatory lecture classes and the only reason they aren’t completely empty is because of required attendance.  I wonder if some professors embrace the idea of making attendance affect grades  because they are secretly aware that if students weren’t punished for not being there they would be lecturing to themselves.

Making attendance mandatory for upper-level classes is just hurting the people who need to be there. So step it up, professors, make your lectures valuable beyond attendance points and take the risk of letting students decide for themselves whether or not it’s valuable for them to be there. Who knows, you might enjoy teaching people who actually want to be there.

Send your thoughts on mandatory attendance to letters@technicianonline.com