Attendance
As a nonmandatory attendance-taking school, the University of Montana requires attendance-taking only for the first three weeks of the semester (or the equivalent for shortened parts of term). Instructors may track attendance beyond the first three weeks, though it is not required.
Student Requirements
Students are required to attend the first two sessions of each class, per the University Catalog.
Instructors may require students who miss these sessions to drop the course to open seats for other students. If a student is required to drop, they must follow the course drop instructions or risk receiving a failing grade.
Note: Instructors may assign an NF (Nonattendance F) if a student never attends and does not drop the class.
Instructor Requirements
All instructors are required to log attendance for the first 15 instructional days of the semester (or the equivalent for part-of-term classes).
Why? Students depend on it financially. Students who attended their classes may experience undue adverse financial consequences if their instructor cannot supply evidence of them meeting the federal attendance requirements for their financial aid.
Example methods for tracking attendance include:
- Recommended: Weekly online quiz or discussion forum in Canvas
- Recommended: Canvas roll call attendance
- Interactive content in an online platform, like TopHat or Cengage
- QR code for an online check-in form or activity
- Physical sign-in sheets
- iClickers
- GrizPortal attendance tracking (only available first 15 days)
Using Canvas to track participation/attendance? Review these pointers to avoid common misinterpretations of
Defining Attendance
Attendance, for financial aid purposes, is online or in-person active engagement with course content.
Examples of qualifying activity:
- Attending a class session
- Completing an assignment, quiz, or exam
- Posting in an online forum
- Participating in an assigned group project or study session
- Emailing about course content
- Insufficient: Discussing dropping/missing class
- Insufficient: Logging in without submitting work (ie. "last activity" date in Canvas, which only represents viewing)
- Insufficient: Online identity verification
Last Dates of Attendance (LDAs)
Instructors are prompted to supply a student's LDA for course drops, semester withdrawals, and final grading.
Course Drop Requests
Course drop requests in Banner Workflow prompt the instructor to note whether the student began attendance in their class when approving the drop request.
Semester Withdrawals
Semester withdrawals for students who receive certain types of financial aid prompt instructors to provide LDAs via emails from the UM Solutions Center.
Note: Canvas activity logs are pulled ahead of time, so these requests are for information not contained in these activity logs.
Replies must be sent within 2 to 3 business days to ensure that the University meets the federal deadline for each student.
Final Grade Entry
LDAs are required when assigning the following grades during final grade entry. Enter an LDA for each student in the MM/DD/YYYY format, or click on the calendar then select a day.
- I (Incomplete)
- F (Fail)
- If the student never attended, assign and NF (Nonattendance-F) instead of a traditional failing grade. This will allow you to save without entering an LDA.
- RF (Remedial F)
- NCR (No Credit)
- There is not currently a credit/no credit grade mark for nonattendance. If the student never attended and has a CR/NCR grade mode, enter the first day of the session as their LDA then email grading@umontana.edu to report nonattendance.
- NC (WRIT classes only)
Be sure to click save as GrizPortal will timeout after 30 minutes of inactivity.
Review your roster to ensure that all grades are entered correctly and include last dates of attendance where necessary. Omitting an LDA is a common reason for seeing an error message.
What happens if we don't receive a last date of attendance?
If we do not obtain any confirmation that a student engaged in a class, we must adhere to the assumption that the student did not attend.
This can have negative financial consequences for the student if they actually attended.