FGCU has a general guideline for attendance policies. If you’re registered for classes, you’re expected to attend them. When students struggle to balance mental health, physical health or disabilities, don’t the rules seem extreme?
Life gets in the way for everyone. There could be an infinite number of reasons why a student doesn’t show up to class throughout a semester. Punishing students by dropping their grade to possible failure, even if they’ve been doing well, is not reasonable.
Professors are permitted to add their own policies for every class, including attendance. For example, they can limit students to three absences or count them for participation and in-class assignments. Students who miss a few classes may face automatic failure, even if they have a 90% in the class. Professors have now begun to focus on participation grades rather than attendance, but the goal is that students must show up for that grade itself.
Some say that students who miss class shouldn’t have the same grade as students who do by the end of the semester, which makes sense to a certain extent.
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If I am the student passing a class I have paid for, does it truly matter if I missed a couple of classes throughout the semester?
There have been times when I have gotten sick, had a family obligation or other personal issues that wouldn’t be easy to speak openly about. Maybe I just needed a day to myself for my own well-being. This doesn’t mean I am skipping classes because I’m doing a poor job. It means life gets in the way and can be overwhelming.
For students who have part-time jobs, these demands make it even harder. Being a full-time student while working is strenuous at times. While it may not be a valid reason to miss classes, it is still something to balance and consider.
FGCU does offer help with Adaptive Services for students who have registered disabilities with the university. A program that works with all students with disabilities, helping them in any way to earn their degrees. Attendance does apply, but they do have different programs to ensure success.
Logistically, attendance policies don’t punish students, even those who work or have disabilities. It’s important to understand how abysmal it can be to punish a student who is maintaining their grades and battling situations outside of a classroom. Telling a student that one of the main excused absences is a bad illness or a death in the family seems to be thrown around too blatantly, especially when there are always less extreme reasons someone will miss class once or twice in a semester.