Guide - Use Blackboard to Take Attendance

Who is this guide for?

USA Faculty

What can this guide help with?

In Blackboard, attendance must be marked for each class meeting/session. Instructors can mark whether a student is present, late, absent, or excused. The attendance records for each student can appear in a single column next to other grades. On the Attendance page, profile pictures appear so you can easily identify students.

You can use attendance as part of grade calculations just as you can for an assignment grade column, but it is not required in the overall grade calculations.

Step 1 - How to Add Attendance and Setup Grading

Overall Setup:

Mark Attendance Day Of:

Mark Attendance After a Class Sessions - "Create A Meeting"

While attendance may be taken during class sessions in various ways, records must be entered into Blackboard as Blackboard is the official record of student attendance. To enter these records, instructors create a meeting in the Overall View, and then mark students' attendance status. Class sessions - "meetings" - are entered one at a time. The step-by-step guide below will walk you through this process. These steps also work for entering attendance taken on prior class sessions. 

Do not mark any attendance for future course meetings that have not yet occurred. If you do, you will be contacted for clarification.

Step 2 - Tour the Attendance Page

Let's take a look at the two different views in the attendance tool, Meeting View and Overall View.

Meeting View

By default, when you open attendance, you'll see the Meeting view for the current day:

A meeting is a specific class session that has occurred where attendance is taken. 

In the Meeting view, you can mark individual student attendance. You can also use the column 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. This view is demonstrated in the Step 1 guide above.

As you mark students' attendance, their attendance grades are posted automatically. If you change students' attendance or clear marks, students see the changes immediately.

Switch Views

To switch between Meeting View and Overall view, click the corresponding button in the upper right of the attendance window:

Overall View

In the Overall view, you can mark attendance, view attendance history and class summary statistics, and create new meetings. It also displays course summary statistics about your students' attendance. Statistics shown are:

• Course average displayed in the grade pill
• Perfect attendance
• Average or above average attendance: Students with perfect attendance are included
• Below average attendance

Notes on Attendance Statistics

• If a student has only excused records, no records at all, or is removed from your course, the student's attendance isn't included in the course summary statistics.
• The number of students listed for each statistic might not equal your total student count.
• 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.

Step 3 - Use the Tool

After reviewing the above, you should be all set with the knowledge to use Blackboard for attendance. If you have any other questions, please Submit a Request.