| Beyond
the tests and quizzes
By Greg Aullman
April 24, 2009 | While driving home
from Rock Springs and tiny Western Wyoming Community
College early one November, a sparkling new Pontiac
Grand Am hit a tiny patch of ice. Roads had been mostly
bare, no snow was falling, and speed hadn't been reduced.
The driver recalled his speed being roughly 65 miles
per hour, which hadn't slowed much when the vehicle
collided head on with a semi pulling two trailers of
coal behind it. The backseat passenger would be thrown
out of the smashed up vehicle only to awake hours later
strapped down in an ambulance. After a week in the hospital,
and a diagnosis of brain damage, the back seat passenger
returned home. The fall semester was nearly over, grades
were coming up due. The student asked a few of his teachers
if he could still drop since the amount of work missed
would be impossible to make up. One of the teachers
was willing to work with the student, agreeing that
if he could take the final and prove at least he had
thought about the material that he could still pass
the class. Two other teachers had complete opposite
reactions, one even told the student that it was too
late to drop the class based on the college's policy,
and that since the wreck had caused the student to miss
three weeks, he meet the attendance requirement and
had flunked the class.
How much a college student learns
computes out to a single letter grade, a grade controlled
by more than just what the student has actually learned.
Students can ace the coursework only to receive a grade
below the A they feel they earned. In those moments
of panic and confusion too often the mind reverts back
to the syllabus, attendance policy, and funeral bells
of sorrow. Teachers counter that their lives are also
busy. They spend hours planning lessons, creating power
point slides, handouts, and designing presentations
to enrich their teaching. Without policies an innumerable
line of students may email and come-in to cram before
a test or assignment, wasting not only the teacher's
time, but the also rest of the class.
In both of these situations classroom
attendance is absolutely pivotal in the educational
experience. The students would argue that they pay for
the right to attend college. Doesn't paying entitle
them whether they choose if they attend without having
to suffer extraneous penalties? Student tuition can
start at $2,000 a semester and quickly escalate from
there. Out-of-state tuition sometimes increase costs
to three-to-four times as much. The teachers point out
that if they don't have some type of attendance policy
in place, last-minute cramming and outside questions
from potentially hundreds of students would quickly
fill free time. Are attendance policies, especially
those that carry a substantial grade percentage, really
necessary at the college level?
A teacher of online classes said
his favorite students are inmates. The inmates are always
ready for class, and attendance is a privilege, consequently
attendance is much stronger than those outside the concrete
walls. Utah State University professor, and journalism
department head, Michael Sweeney said he missed an art
history class once because he had to go to a job interview
only to later find a professor back on campus unwilling
to work with him on making up assignments.
What constitutes a good excuse, or
um…, valid reason to miss a class? That may depend in
large part on the people involved, teachers as well
as students. USU freshman Kaitlyn Sprouse recalled missing
a class in order to watch another episode of the famous
sitcom "Friends". Fellow USU student Candice
Sandness said her roommate once received all-day snowboarding
passes that couldn't be returned. She decided to give
in and go, only to return back to class and find she
had missed a quiz.
Michael Sweeney said a student he
had actually went into labor during class. He said students
have busy lives, family and personal situations may
arise, hopefully just not of the increasing family-size-through
birth variety.
Sweeney compares the class to life.
In life some jobs allow you to call in and negotiate
with your superiors, in the case of a journalist their
editors, and circumvent life's little bumps. Sweeney
said that he would be willing to work with students.
If a student told him, "I was being held hostage
and they wouldn't let me use a phone," such a situation
would warrant missing class.
Attendance policies can range from
a major portion of the final grade, to a minor add-on,
to an extra-credit opportunity offered by the teacher
to help motivate slacking students. Attendance policies
can come in the form of daily attendance, taken perhaps
with names called out, or some type of electronic clicker
that verifies that the student is there. Attendance
can be measured by simply being in a room, or with a
more in-depth intellectual assessment such as a quiz
perhaps administered via the $30 I-clickers plaguing
campus. Some policies take the form of a write-up regarding
the events and activities of the class that help to
not only verify the student was there, but that they
took something from the proceedings. Some attendance
points are awarded for performance on random quizzes.
The quizzes may even be hinted at in previous classes
to make sure more students will attend. Many of these
attendance policies will allow for the dropping of one
or a few of the lowest scores to compensate for student
emergencies.
The recession seems to add another
element to the quandary. As tuition and fees rise, students
are forced to work or face enormous amounts of debt
on graduation. Teachers, perhaps fearing for the loss
of their jobs, feel pressured to make sure that student
reviews and class performance stay at high levels.
A criticism of American public schools
points at the range of students, from the most intelligent
in the class, to the least, who learn at the same level
as those in the middle. Do college courses do the same?
When students are able to pass the standard exams, quizzes
and assignments, is it fair to reduce their grade because
they don't require the same in-class learning as others?
For some students attendance points guarantee points
that help boost their grades from mediocre to honor-roll
status, while others attend sporadically and attendance
doesn't change much.
If academics is looked at as a series
of hoops that students need to jump through in order
to obtain their degrees, then attendance policies are
just another hoop in the process. Teachers like Sweeney
may equate learning with more of a job training. Teachers
may correlate classroom attendance with building a work
ethic that will instill the discipline necessary to
excel in the workplace. Classroom attendance in that
view supersedes quizzes and lectures. Instead the focus
is aimed at creating a generation of responsible employees
and employers. A dependable generation to enter the
workforce that will help pay the teacher's Social-Security
benefits years down the road.
Other teachers may view their material
as of the utmost importance. Discussions are aimed at
broadening student viewpoints, helping to create a generation
that is not burdened by bigoted viewpoints. The classroom
is supposed to be an open forum in which students are
free to not only express their views, but also to more
fully understand the viewpoints of others. Attendance
in this case is supposed to be critical. Without opposing
viewpoints then studies would only reinforce existing,
potentially flawed or narrow-minded viewpoints.
Students may counter these arguments
with their own perspectives. A recurring statement floated
around campus, "C's get degrees." Students
may feel that perfect workplace attendance supersedes
perfect college attendance. Students may be sick of
high school attendance policies and requirements and
expect college classes to be different. Also students
may be required through in-major or general courses
to take a variety of "broadening" classes
that make them sick of sitting in a room where everyone
argues their own perspectives, but no one seems to change
their minds. Kaitlyn Sprouse said that when she first
came to college she leaned towards earning strong grades,
but now leans more on the "C's get degrees,"
ideology. Candice Sandness said she is paying for her
education and needs to get the most out of the experience
to help her in her future career. Both felt that attendance
should not be a required part of college though.
Are there regulations where classroom
attendance and participation account for a certain percentage
of any given grade? If so who defines those? Sweeney
said that teachers are generally free to make their
own decisions. A universal policy would require a faculty
meeting and vote on a departmental level.
For those who favor policies should
there be compromises in the policies? Should there be
alternative assignments that could offset the loss of
attendance points if students are willing to do extra
work outside of the classroom? Should freshmen, sophomores,
juniors, seniors and even graduates be required to meet
the same policies?
Current teachers may have seen their
personal viewpoints change as they moved from the ranks
of undergraduate to teacher. Students may see their
stances waver as they go from unemployed to employed
during the school year, and time becomes a more valuable
commodity. Kaitlyn Sprouse said, "The hardest thing
about college is managing my time."
Attendance can be looked at from
a variety of perspectives. Students may feel as Candice
does, "Always do your readings and be prepared
for class with questions, which makes lectures and discussions
more engaging, and you'll be getting more for your tuition
money." Other students may argue that they take
interest in what they want, but the interest has to
be mutual. Teachers who are primarily researchers required
to teach a class or two or teachers who are there because
of the paycheck certainly can't expect students to be
more interested in class than they are.
As the economy slumps and the rising
cost of tuition gives more worth to earning a degree,
attendance may become an issue that helps teachers maintain
a responsible generation, but allows students the freedom
to enjoy their last few years before joining the grind
of the fabled "real world" that adults have
been telling them about for years.
MS
KS
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