Why don’t they attend? Factors that influence the attendance of HE students of education

ABSTRACT

This paper explores the factors that influence attendance to taught sessions in higher education. Absenteeism is approached as a complex phenomenon that is problematic when considering how students, lecturers and universities relate to it. Our study is conducted as a case study based on a large post-92 university in England, focusing on the undergraduate Education Studies programme. We took a collaborative approach with students and staff as research partners. Data were collected through one-to-one interviews with different members of staff and focus groups with students in all the 3 years of the programme. We used a thematic network analysis to generate a visual representation of the subthemes that emerged from collaborative analysis. Our findings show that attendance is a situated decision that can be articulated in relation to two sets of factors. The first set refers to university imperatives, and which relate to discourses of performativity and accountability. The second set relates to the complexities of students’ lives. In the intersection between these two clusters of concerns, the tension between the two sets of discourses plays out and has implications for the degree of engagement that students have with the university and their courses.

KEYWORDS:

• Attendance
• absenteeism
• engagement
• collaborative research
• student experience

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

David Menendez Alvarez-Hevia

David Menendez Alvarez Hevia is Senior Lecturer in Education Studies at Manchester Metropolitan University. He has been involved in teaching, leading, and developing different Undergraduate and Master programmes in the area of education. He is interested in understanding educational issues from a theoretical and socio-political perspective, combining critical and philosophical lenses to approach education in its wider sense. Over the last few years, David has shown a special sensitivity to the problems associated to the marketisation of Higher Education. In this line, some of his latest research projects focus on the exploration of ideas associated to employability, attendance and internationalisation.

Janet Lord

Janet Lord is the Faculty head of Education at Manchester Metropolitan University. She has worked at a number of Higher Education Institutions, in psychology, education studies and teacher education. Her research interest includes Higher Education, disadvantage, inclusion and inclusive pedagogies, professional identity, teacher identity, gender and disadvantage, professional development in teachers, reflective practice & reflexivity.

Steven Naylor

Steven Naylor is senior lecturer and programme lead for Education Studies at Manchester Metropolitan University. He has a key role in developing the Education Studies course in the changing nature of the landscape of Education as a discipline. His interest is in understanding the range of places and contexts in which education takes place. He pays particular attention to the shifts in students’ expectations and understandings of their role as educational thinkers and professionals.