Dear Colleagues,
As we begin the fall semester, I want to share a few thoughts about attendance and its relationship to student success.
One of my goals this year is to better understand, empirically, the role that attendance plays in our students’ academic outcomes at Ball State. We know that showing up matters, but I want us to develop a more nuanced understanding of how it matters, when it matters most, and what we can learn from the different ways faculty approach attendance across courses and disciplines.
As part of that work, later this semester I will be administering a faculty survey to better understand attendance-taking practices across the University, including whether and how attendance is tracked, how attendance is incorporated into course expectations and grading, and how those practices may relate to student course outcomes. Ultimately, I hope this work will help us better understand the relationship between attendance, engagement, academic performance, and student persistence.
Right now, however, we are at an especially important point in the semester. We are in the attendance verification period, and I encourage you to complete your attendance verification as promptly as possible. This week, you will receive requests through Navigate to submit attendance alerts for students who are not showing up for class.
These processes serve slightly different purposes, but both give us an opportunity to act early. When we know that a student has not begun attending or has stopped showing up, we can reach out before a pattern becomes more difficult to reverse. In some cases, a student may not fully understand their enrollment status or schedule. In others, something may already be getting in the way of their ability to engage. An attendance alert gives us an opportunity to find out what is happening and connect the student with support.
Our goal is not simply to document absence. It is to use the information we have to intervene early, help students understand the importance of attending and engaging in their courses, and make sure that students who may be struggling do not quietly disappear from our classrooms.
Thank you for your partnership in this work and, especially, for everything you are doing to help our students get off to a strong start this semester.
Jason
Jason Rivera, Ph.D.
Vice Provost for Student Success,
Dean of University College, &
Associate Clinical Professor of Higher Education
Ball State University
765-285-4015
Pronouns: He | Him | His