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MCC Daily Tribune Archive

The Benefits of Taking Attendance in Starfish


Beginning this Fall 2016, all faculty who would like to take attendance in Starfish may do so because their entire student roster will be visible now instead of just the special populations from last year’s pilot.  Using the attendance feature in Starfish has many benefits:

What is the benefit of attendance taking for students? 

Students will receive early and automatic flags when an attendance problem occurs, encouraging them to speak with their instructor(s) about missing classes and about what steps they can take to ensure they may remain in the course. 

What is the benefit of attendance taking for faculty?

If you already take daily attendance and try to reach out to students whose attendance is becoming a concern or impacting grades, Starfish can make that process easier and more consistent. 

What is the benefit of attendance taking for MCC?

Retention!  With earlier notifications, we may be able to reach students who might otherwise end up being withdrawn for unsatisfactory attendance.  We can also catch students before the census date, rather than waiting until the census to indicate whether students are regularly attending classes.

Taking attendance in Starfish is a simple process (see the attached How To), which allows the system to automatically raise flags when students meet certain criteria.  For example, if a student misses the first day of a course, misses 3 days, or misses 4 days, flags will be generated by Starfish, alleviating faculty from manually raising attendance concern flags.

The Starfish Team hopes you find this newest feature helpful to you and your students! 

See the attached “How To” on taking attendance in Starfish

The Starfish Team
Title III
08/31/2016


Attachments:
icon Attendance How To.pdf