Shorter Dean Dad: “I’m Too Lazy to Take Attendance. Let Me Go Back to My Research”
By I have an active a research agenda as any untenured academic, but I also love teaching. So do most academics that I know. Part of loving teaching is placing value on your course. If you don’t care enough to take attendance, at least in courses that aren’t huge, why should the students care enough to come? Aren’t you just telling them that it’s not very important? Dean Dad disagrees, meandering around the reasons, but it seems to come down to the fact that he just doesn’t want to deal with the paperwork.
How requiring attendance in upper division courses at a large state institution will go over, I don’t know. But I’ll be finding out this spring.
…..there’s an interesting conversation going on about this on the twitters @studentactivism