Anyone who has studied at school and university knows that attending classes is compulsory, and the absence of them entails negative sanctions up to exemptions. Ultimately, the strictest punishment – expulsion – is an extension of the logic that attendance is closely related to academic performance. However, the validity of this approach can be questioned since the success of the completed training should be assessed by a student’s performance on the exams, tests, and other tools for their evaluation. They show how successfully the student has mastered the taught disciplines. Thus, in the paper, it will be argued that attendance should not be tied to exemptions.
An example from my personal experience can serve as a confirmation of this thesis. I was fond of mathematics but I did it more at home and in additional sections outside school. It turned out that when I came to class, I already knew the material taught by the teacher. I was lucky, and my teacher took an individual approach to me, giving me simple assignments and discussing in-depth material with me in my free time. However, if I were not so lucky, attending math classes would be a waste of time, and my absence from class did not seem to demonstrate my ability in the subject.
The broader picture shows many examples where the lack of student attendance indicates a failure of the educational process, the reasons for which should be investigated more closely, rather than reducing everything to student exclusion. For example, the problem may be in the teacher and many other issues related to the learning process itself. In addition, the students can have a difficult life situation, and the approach to each case should be individual. For example, a student needs to combine study with work, and sometimes, the schedules are the same, which leads to missing some classes. Although the student is not physically present in the class, they can be in close contact with colleagues in their studies, as well as engage in additional work on the course (for example, in-depth reading on the topics covered), which allows them to keep their finger on the pulse of the class and follow the curriculum with everyone.
Thus, attendance should not be tied to exemptions. Results, not processes, should measure academic success and student performance. The approach to resolving missing classes should be individual and take into account the situation of each student. Non-attendance does not mean an unequivocal failure within the course, and the fact that students are not attending classes can be attributed to many other factors, the study of which can help identify problems in the educational process.