Attendance
Attendance
The Attendance tool allows instructors to set attendance grading rules, enter attendance for each class meeting, and import attendance grades into the Blackboard gradebook.
Table of Contents
Add Attendance to course gradebook
In the Details & Actions menu, select Mark attendance.
When you access the attendance feature for the first time, you will be prompted to add attendance to your gradebook. Select add attendance. An attendance column will appear in the gradebook.
Once you select Add Attendance, the Settings panel opens. Select from Letter, Points or Percentages from the drop down menu. If you want to include excused in the grading calculations, toggle it on. Save your settings. If you close the panel without hitting the save button, your changes won't be saved.
Present: Set at 100%. This value is fixed and cannot be changed
Late: Default is set at 50%. You can adjust this percentage in the Settings panel to increase or decrease the credit awarded.
Absent: Set at 0%. This value is fixed and cannot be changed.
Excused: Counts as Present for scoring purposes. You can choose whether to include Excused in calculations.
Edit Attendance Settings
If you need to edit the settings after you have initially set up the attendance tool, from the Details & Actions menu, select Mark attendance. Select the settings icon (gear) in the upper right hand corner. The settings panel will open where you can make your changes. Once you have updated your changes, be sure to Save your settings.
Attendance Meeting View
By default, when you open attendance, you'll see the Meeting view for the current day even if you haven't finished marking a previous meeting.
In the Meeting view, you can mark each student's attendance. You can also use the menu in a status's heading to mark all students present or absent. Then, you can change individual students' statuses or clear all marks. Your work is saved as you go.
As you mark students' attendance, their attendance grades are posted automatically. If you change students' attendance or clear marks, students see the changes immediately.
Use the Previous and Next Meeting arrows to navigate between meeting dates.
Meeting View on small devices
Meeting view is the only view that appears on small devices.
Select the today tab and select from the menu options. Mark all present or absent will update the attendance tool for all students to reflect the choice you made.
Mark all present
Marks all students present and is denoted with a green box with a check
To change a student's attendance, click in the green box with the check. This will allow you to select one of the other options.
Mark all absent
Marks all students absent and is denoted with a red box with an X
Clear Marks
Will clear attendance marks
Exempt meeting
You can exempt a meeting that no longer requires an attendance grade. When you exempt a meeting, the status options are disabled until you clear the exemption. Exempt meeting columns will appear gray and all grid cell menus are disabled. A null or empty value (--) appears for all students without a mark. If you marked students with a status, those statuses remain but are read-only and you can't change them. Students' overall attendance grades will not include the exempted meeting, even if you've marked some or all student cells. The status options will remain disabled until you clear the exemption. To clear the exemption, click on the date column header and select Clear exemption.
Edit Meeting
Select the Today column header to open the menu and select Edit meeting. You can choose a new date from the pop-up calendar. If you change the date of a meeting or select Go to Today, all meetings are chronologically sorted when you close and open the Attendance page.
Delete meeting
In the Meeting view, select the date column header to open the menu and select Delete meeting. Once deleted, all attendance information cannot be retrieved. Student's overall attendance grades update to exclude the deleted meeting. If you accidentally deleted a meeting and want to put it back, you will have to select the Today column header and select edit meeting. From here, select the date from the calendar you deleted and add student attendance.
Attendance Scores
Scores
The Meeting view scores are always percentages regardless of the schema you chose in the Settings panel. Because the Meeting view shows only one status, you'll see the percentage because it's the weight of that one status.
Click on a student's names to view a summary of their overall attendance records. You can see how many class meetings each student has attended, missed and/or was late. Each student's Overall Score appears with the schema you chose in the Settings panel. This view is read-only.
Attendance Overall View
Overall course attendance statistics
In the Overall view, you can view several meetings and see overall course attendance statistics. If a student has only excused records, no records at all, or is removed from your course, the student's attendance is NOT included in the course summary statistics. If every student has an attendance record, the average/above average and below average statistics add up to all students. Unavailable students' information appears read-only and their previous attendance grades won't be included in the course summary statistics.
Course average displayed in the grade pill
Number of students with perfect attendance
Number of students with average or above average attendance: Students with perfect attendance are included
Number of students with below average attendance
Download course attendance
In the overall view, you can download the attendance data by clicking on the download icon to the right of the course statistics.
Add a new meeting column
In the overall view, you can add additional columns to track attendance. To add a new column, hover your pointer over the line separating the date headers and Select the plus icon that appears. A new column will appear to the right of the purple line.
To change the meeting date, click on the date in the column header and select Edit Meeting.
Use the date widget to select a date for the new column.
Delete a meeting column
To delete a meeting in the overall view, select a date column header to open the menu and select Delete meeting.
