Attendance Feature Needs Excused Absence Option

[KarolynSteffens]

My college just switched from Blackboard to Canvas. The attendance tool in Blackboard was one of the only things that I have found far superior to Canvas. Canvas does not have the option to mark absences as excused. I can add a badge to absences that labels them excused but the students cannot see the badges and it still deducts the points as if it were an unexcused absence. 

My attendance policy allows for a certain number of unexcused vs. excused absences. There are significant grade implications for these and the distinction very much matters to final semester grades. Not having this ability for students to see how many excused vs. unexcused absences they have is a major problem and flaw in the design that is already creating confusion and anxiety in my students. 

Any help overhauling this or simply just adding the option of "excused absence" would be much appreciated! 

[KristinL · Accepted solution]

Hi @KarolynSteffens -

Thank you for sharing this idea! With a few more days of participation, you'll increase your Community rank, and you'll be able to post this in the Ideas & Themes space. There, members of the Product Team evaluate customer-authored ideas and align them to future projects.

How do I create a new idea in the Instructure Community? 

[jrjones2]

"Increase your community rank" and be able to post in other areas? Since when did Canvas become the Reddit of LMS's? This might be another (of many) of Canvas's major problems. My university has used Canvas for at least 10 years, and has dealt with multiple updates/overhauls, but seriously, simply creating an "excused absence" option for attendance is STILL not a feature? *repeatedly slams face into desk*

My current workaround (which shouldn't have to be a necessity) is to mark students with excused absences as late, and have "late" attendance count as 100% attendance, and have lateness be factored into a separate "participation" grade so that (chronically) late students can be penalized as deemed fit.

If you guys can do all this fancy stuff with the "New Quizzes," SURELY it is not that hard to code an additional "excused absence" option for attendance. Sheesh.

[MariaDeutsch]

I have the same problem - I need to be able to track unexcused and excused absences separately, in addition to presence and lateness. This problem has so far not been resolved, despite numerous people pointing it out in the community.

[JessicaMattiace]

So the way I did this last semester was that I entered attendance as an assignment and gave it a 1 point value. Students who were present got a 1, students who were late simply got marked late with a 1, students who were excused got marked as excused, with reasons in the comments and students who were unexcused got a 0. I just started using the attendance function in Canvas this semester and I don't like it. I might switch back to putting it in as assignments.