By Tom Lowe
The debate relating to student attendance persists in higher education – with questions on whether universities should mandate minimum levels of attendance, as is practice with professional courses and international students, or whether we should be more laissez-faire with our (independent, volunteer, adult) learners. My prior blogs have discussed the reasons why students may not be attending as much post COVID-19, and how perhaps, engagement preferences are changing in the modern university, due to changes in communication and services in wider society. As universities work to support student outcomes through learning analytics platforms, such as Simac, this blog asks whether there is cause to review valid reasons not to attend, if attendance rules are brought in for individual courses, or wider areas of provision.
So this blog will ask, what currently counts as a valid reason not to attend? Well, speaking generally across the sector, most education providers draw from human resource cultures in professions concerning an acceptable reason not to attend. This will of course include students being personally unwell, compassionate reasons (such as a loss or illness of a loved one), health appointments, and extreme weather preventing travel (well, pre-COVID-19 anyway… perhaps will never see a ‘snow day’ closure again). Beyond these overt reasons for absence, things get blurrier and more subjective, where often students with persisting or long-term circumstances (like employees) can agree flexibility through study plans, due to longer term or more personal circumstances, which can include the reasons above, but also individual life circumstances, like housing trouble, long term health considerations, and supporting loved ones (such as caring responsibilities of dependants).
So far, relatively straight forward, right? Well as highlighted in my prior blog on why are students attending less post COVID-19, I referenced a report evidencing how stark the cost of the living crisis is for students, causing students to prioritise work over engaging with timetabled content. The question now can be asked, if a student is so financially stretched and flexible study is available, is not attending in order to do paid work, to support the continuation of studies, a fair reason not to attend? From a retention perspective, it sounds like yes. But from a learning perspective when addressing student outcomes, perhaps not? Another common reason is students having a deadline in another module/class, where they are being strategic in putting time into one assessment now, and prioritising that class and its associated assessment later (Tony Harland warned us of this back in 2015, with his influential paper on the assessment arms race – see link below). From a student success perspective, sounds respectable right? But there will always be a counter argument of better time management. So, when learning is made accessible with catch up materials, and some universities taking this seriously with institutional priorities to University Design for Learning, keeping ‘on track’ with the learning whether you attend or not can be very doable and sometimes necessary.
How about another challenge facing universities – what is a good reason to be late to class? Lateness to class is increasingly referenced when I speak with colleagues across the sector, who have expressed their puzzlement and frustration in how they should react to students turning up 10, 15, 30 or even 50 minutes late to their class, often without warning or apology. Traditional impressions of education, again informed by either by the workplace, or prior education levels, is that being late is bad (and maybe disrespectful), and therefore, culturally we think that something should be done about this. But thinking more widely, and when speaking with students, the reasons are often due to external factors and not intentional. The trains or buses running late, having to drop off children prior to travelling to university, caring responsibilities making morning timekeeping less predictable, and, increasingly, peak time travel costing too much. All sound like valid reasons to be late , but are still disruptive for the educator who will design their session from introduction to end, building knowledge across the session – how can you catch someone up on the story when they have missed the beginning and middle and as educators, we ask if it is our responsibility to do so at the expense of other students who were there from the start.
A further consideration in this conversation is the need to provide evidence for one’s non-attendance or non-submission of assessments to legitimise it under the current HR-driven acceptable reasons, which is now easier said than done – and if anything, getting more difficult. With a stretched UK healthcare service, acquiring a doctor’s note is getting harder, particularly for short term illness which may prevent attendance on a certain day, and even impossible for a minor illness like flu. For mental health, just as difficult, particularly if it is not pre-diagnosed. Then for the loss of a loved one it is possible to get evidence but not a pleasant, care-informed, approach at all, where institutions have in the past even requested a death certificate. These difficulties with acquiring evidence, which are confirmed by a simple parent’s telephone call or letter at prior education levels, creates additional pressures for students and administrators alike relating to extenuating circumstances, assessment deadlines, and mandatory attendance requirements. This has led many universities to decrease evidence requests for extenuating circumstances, with many ‘self-certification’ processes introduced particular during the COVID-19 pandemic.
To conclude, student engagement with attendance is messy where disadvantaged students are more likely to face barriers such as finances, access to health services, free time, and proximity to campus, which are all issues going to impact the ability to attend. When reviewing the above, if someone has caring responsibilities, the need to work, children or a greater financial distance to travel, then attendance is going to be more difficult, and risk of lateness increased. The current context is difficult, where providers are exploring variations of so-called ‘block’ methods to decrease days on campus for students to support financial decision making. Institutions should be more empathetic to the factors that can lead to student lateness, and perhaps support students with funding for travel to campus. Finally, it is important to reflect on reasons not to attend, such as minor health conditions which are harder to evidence should be considered, as well as how catch up materials provide support for students in continuing their studies.
About the author:
Tom Lowe has researched and innovated in student engagement across diverse settings for over ten years, in areas such as student voice, retention, employability and student-staff partnership. Tom works at the University of Westminster as Assistant Head of School (Student Experience) in Finance and Accounting where he leads on student experience, outcomes and belonging. Tom is also the Chair of RAISE, a network for all stakeholders in higher education for researching, innovating and sharing best practice in student engagement. Prior to Westminster, Tom was a Senior Lecturer in Higher Education at the University of Portsmouth, and previously held leadership positions for engagement and employability at the University of Winchester. Tom has published two books on student engagement with Routledge; ‘A Handbook for Student Engagement in Higher Education: Theory into Practice’ in 2020 and ‘Advancing Student Engagement in Higher Education: Reflection, Critique and Challenge’ in 2023, and has supported over 40 institutions in consultancy and advisory roles internationally.
Further readings:
Harland, T. and Wald, N., 2021. The assessment arms race and the evolution of a university’s assessment practices. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 46(1), pp.105-117.
Merry, K., 2024. What block learning taught me about meeting diverse student needs. Times Higher Education, 2nd July 2024. Available at: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/campus/what-block-learning-taught-me-about-meeting-diverse-student-needs
