OK, first off I'm simply venting here because currently all my friends are unavailable. It's just venting and it's in the junk drawer, so don't flame me. If you don't want to read it, then don't post in this thread.
I fucking hate attendance policies. They are a completely lame excuse to lower a student's grades simply because they didn't attend a completely frivilous and boring class that is somehow required. If the class is completely taught by a Teaching Assistant (TA) and the proffessor who supervises the course never shows his face once, I don't feel I should be required to be there.
I came to my current level of frustration due to the following situation. First off, my university classifies me as a "nontraditional student" which acknowledges the fact that I'm a grown up and not in need of certain supervisions the university normally requires. (For example, students are required to live in the residence halls their first year of college and take courses like "Freshman Orientation" to teach them how to do things on their own.) Currently I'm finishing up a semester here and I'm dealing with taking finals and that kind of thing. I got an email from one of my TA's informing me he is planning on failing me. Not due to my grades or performance in the class, but because of my attendance. I missed a total of 11 days out of 42 days of class. I understand this is about a quarter of the class, but there would have been more days, except my TA didn't show up for one reason or another. I feel those days should count in my favor if I show up and he doesn't. If you were to take attendance out of the course, I would have well above a 90% average in the course. On almost all individual projects, I received near perfect scores (including exams and quizes) and the only thing that would be dragging me below a 95% would be a couple of key group projects that one member of the team kept screwing us over on. My class has no policy for an excused absence. Instead you are given four absences and every absence over that 50 points are deducted from your overall total (a perfect score in the class = 1000 points.)
I can only think of two reasons for an attendance policy at this time. The first is that parents are upset when they pay for their kids to go to college and then they fail out, because they are too busy partying. The second is because proffessors teach in a manor that is incredibly boring and are upset when they show up to an almost empty classroom. I've argued countless times with professors that I know personally about this and the only thing they can use in their defense is that students tend to have higher grades when they attend class. I don't think this is true. I think the correct statement is that students do better when they go to class and pay attention. If a student goes simply because they are forced, they tend to talk, do crosswords, listen to their iPod, or be disruptive.
If anyone can think of a valid reason attendance should have an effect on a student's grades, espicially one based on your ability to write a paper, I would love to hear it.
[/venting]
I fucking hate attendance policies. They are a completely lame excuse to lower a student's grades simply because they didn't attend a completely frivilous and boring class that is somehow required. If the class is completely taught by a Teaching Assistant (TA) and the proffessor who supervises the course never shows his face once, I don't feel I should be required to be there.
I came to my current level of frustration due to the following situation. First off, my university classifies me as a "nontraditional student" which acknowledges the fact that I'm a grown up and not in need of certain supervisions the university normally requires. (For example, students are required to live in the residence halls their first year of college and take courses like "Freshman Orientation" to teach them how to do things on their own.) Currently I'm finishing up a semester here and I'm dealing with taking finals and that kind of thing. I got an email from one of my TA's informing me he is planning on failing me. Not due to my grades or performance in the class, but because of my attendance. I missed a total of 11 days out of 42 days of class. I understand this is about a quarter of the class, but there would have been more days, except my TA didn't show up for one reason or another. I feel those days should count in my favor if I show up and he doesn't. If you were to take attendance out of the course, I would have well above a 90% average in the course. On almost all individual projects, I received near perfect scores (including exams and quizes) and the only thing that would be dragging me below a 95% would be a couple of key group projects that one member of the team kept screwing us over on. My class has no policy for an excused absence. Instead you are given four absences and every absence over that 50 points are deducted from your overall total (a perfect score in the class = 1000 points.)
I can only think of two reasons for an attendance policy at this time. The first is that parents are upset when they pay for their kids to go to college and then they fail out, because they are too busy partying. The second is because proffessors teach in a manor that is incredibly boring and are upset when they show up to an almost empty classroom. I've argued countless times with professors that I know personally about this and the only thing they can use in their defense is that students tend to have higher grades when they attend class. I don't think this is true. I think the correct statement is that students do better when they go to class and pay attention. If a student goes simply because they are forced, they tend to talk, do crosswords, listen to their iPod, or be disruptive.
If anyone can think of a valid reason attendance should have an effect on a student's grades, espicially one based on your ability to write a paper, I would love to hear it.
[/venting]
