Contents
Catalog Links

ATTENDANCE CONSIDERATIONS

Courses should be designed with attendance in mind based on the technical components of internal attendance systems.

Automated Attendance

D2L Brightspace is integrated with USU's Student Information System. This allows for automated attendance-taking and submission of final grades through the course gradebook. The attendance policy from the Catalog is programmed into the SIS, with the following logic:

●Students who do not attend the first week (7 days) of a course are automatically dropped by the system (not by a person)

●After the first week of a course, students who do not attend for 14 consecutive days are automatically dropped by the system (not by a person)

Implications & Course Design Requirements

Because of the automated attendance, a poorly structured course could lead to students being dropped who should not be. To avoid this, courses should be structured with at least one attendance-recording activity per week.

Attendance-Recording Activities include:

  • Posting to a discussion forum in the D2L course shell
  • Submitting a quiz in the D2L course shell
  • Submitting an assignment to an assignment drop-box in the D2L course shell

Weekly Discussions:

Most USU programs require at least one discussion-forum activity per week to avoid attendance issues. This may be a traditional discussion question, or it may be a group activity that requires students to participate in the forum, or it may be something else that will trigger the recording. Check with your program lead faculty.