The following piece is an opinion and does not reflect the views of The Eagle and its staff. All opinions are edited for grammar, style and argument structure and fact-checked, but the opinions are the writer’s own.
College is where most individuals have their first truly independent experiences. It is often a person’s first time living in a new city and environment away from their hometown. Students have much more freedom in college — they can choose what they want to study and what classes to take. Students at American University can spend their time as they like by studying, exploring the city or doing anything else that D.C. offers.
Considering this freedom, it would make sense that college classes offer many student choices. Among these choices might be the option to skip class if the student has a good reason. However, this is not the case. AU’s Undergraduate Academic Rules and Regulations state that “unexcused absences may affect a student’s grade.”
In every class I’ve taken at AU, this regulation manifests itself in syllabi as mandatory attendance. Though mandatory attendance makes sense in some classes, such as discussion-heavy ones, it is usually unnecessary. Instead of encouraging learning, it creates a culture where students check off the box of attendance rather than coming to class to learn.
Mandatory attendance detracts from learning, especially in lecture-based classes. In statistics and economics classes, I’ve felt that I learn best through repetition, which often happens outside of class. In my statistics class, I found that most of my learning happened while I was doing homework. Because of this, I decided to skip the class before we had an exam so I could independently review my homework assignments. I was penalized for this absence even though this study time helped me perform better on the exam.
In cases like this one, mandatory attendance forces some students to use their time unproductively and can affect the independence they have in their learning. Without mandatory attendance, students can miss classes covering material they are already familiar with. They could use this extra time to brush up on unfamiliar concepts, do work for other classes or explore D.C.
In discussing student independence, it is important to consider what students pay in tuition to the University. The University’s cost of attendance for first-year students in the 2024-25 academic year is $79,622, demonstrating that students provide significant financial support to AU. This support should be ample reason for the University to prioritize students’ interests. Promoting independence is a way to do this. The money we pay the University is in exchange for the opportunity to take classes, earn a degree and make connections. We pay for the opportunity to do these things, but this does not mean the University should mandate coming to class.
Professors at AU — and universities in general — should tailor their attendance policies to the specific needs of a class. For example, a lecture-heavy psychology class should have a very flexible attendance policy, or none at all, because students don’t benefit as much from peer interaction in a lecture class. This kind of policy would allow students to strategically skip classes where content they already know is covered. A discussion-heavy philosophy class, though, might have a stricter attendance policy. This is especially important on days when content is discussed among peers since a full classroom is necessary for productive discussion. These tailored policies create a culture where students can be independent in their education. It focuses on deliberate decisions rather than arbitrary regulations, preparing students for life after college instead of teaching them how to scrape by in college.
Admittedly, students need class attendance to engage with material and interact with peers. Some students also might learn better in person than from a textbook. These arguments are valid, but they do not address the root of the issue — that students deserve freedom. Some students might abuse a new policy and skip plenty of classes, but this will likely be reflected in their learning and, consequently, their grades. This freedom can allow students to learn the value of in-person classes while giving them the option to miss certain classes when they can use their time more efficiently.
AU’s current policies create a culture of mandatory attendance where students don’t prioritize their learning. AU should make its attendance policy much more flexible while encouraging professors to make rules reflect their respective courses. If professors tailor their attendance policies to maximize student independence, they allow students to learn how to be more independent. This teaches students something they wouldn’t tend to learn explicitly in a classroom and prepares them for the real world.
Avyay Sriperumbudur is a sophomore in the School of Public Affairs and College of Arts and Sciences and a columnist for The Eagle.
This article was edited by Quinn Volpe, Alana Parker and Abigail Turner. Copy editing done by Luna Jinks, Olivia Citarella, Emma Brown, Nicole Kariuki and Charlie Mennuti.
