The attendance management system is software that creates a digital record for students’ presence in the school. The system uses cloud-based servers and is entirely paperless. Institutions can opt for a manual attendance system or thumb impression/card-based bio metric one.
In the case of a manual attendance system, the teacher needs to manually mark students as present or absent for the class using the online software. It can be accessed via a PC, laptop, or smartphone app.
The biometric system works with the help of card/thumb impression-based readers that are installed at the school’s common entrance and outside classrooms. Attendance gets marked when the student puts a thumb on the reader. Students need to take the RFID card near the card reader and mark his or her presence in the case of a card-based system. Later, when the trainee leaves the classroom and enters again, the system automatically marks the time between classroom entry and exit as a break. Teachers can easily monitor the same.
How can the digital system prove helpful for teachers and administrators?
Gone are the days of pen and manual attendance registers. Several public schools in Tamil Nadu, Delhi, Gujarat, and Maharashtra have installed digital attendance systems to reduce the unnecessary burden that teachers face.
With a paperless system in place, teachers no longer need to struggle with attendance sheets or registers. There is no need for professors to start their day with attendance anymore as students mark the same while entering the classroom. Trainers can use every single minute for teaching. It results in better engagement and an increase in classroom productivity.
Tracking absenteeism and creating daily, monthly attendance reports was one of the most cumbersome tasks earlier. Errors in attendance records resulted in hours’ worth of recounting, redoing, and reworking for teachers. With digital systems, there is no scope for mistakes, resulting in saved time and efforts taken by teachers.
Earlier, faculties had no other option but to wait until the parent-teacher meeting or use the student’s school diary to share attendance-related observations with parents. The attendance system’s integration with ERP and parent-teacher app enables teachers to automatically send alerts concerning their child’s classroom presence to the guardians. It helps in detecting the uninformed absence of students in the school.
The information remains well-organized and easily retrievable in digital format. The faculty can scrutinize the attendance data for students as per their roll numbers.
As data remains accessible on the cloud-servers, teachers can easily share the same with parents via the parent-teacher app, email, or SMS.
Monthly reports can also be generated within minutes and made available on the school’s website.
Administrators who manage multiple schools from a centralized location can easily track absenteeism records from various campuses and create action plans for improvement. Administrators and trainers can also access logs using mobile apps.
Digital solutions make attendance record sharing easy. But is sharing child’s school attendance data with parents vital?
These days, educators realize that they can use parents as valuable partners to improve students’ academic performance. Thus, they believe in using the best technology for involving parents in their child’s education. Schools are making investments in the infrastructure for ensuring they can improve transparency and communicate with parents easily.
Most parents actively discuss school syllabus, homework, and even help children in reading while at home to assist them in learning.
Several studies have already proved how parents’ involvement can result in a positive impact on children’s academic performance. Kids show consistent improvement when parents are involved in their school activities. Research has also proved that the involvement of guardians in studies results in low truancy and school dropout rates.
Schools can use simple, low-cost strategies to keep parents updated on the child’s classroom attendance and the importance of the same. Such constant communication even helps in reducing chronic absenteeism.
As per a study published by Harvard, kids whose parents received updates about their school attendance showed eight percent lower absenteeism than students whose parents did not receive any reminders from the school. Simple messages helped in reducing chronic absenteeism by as much as 15 percent. Put simply, keeping parents aware of the child’s attendance with any form of messages proves useful for improving attendance percentage. Messages and notifications can be as good as in-person dialogue. Family members feel more connected to the child’s studies and school.
Parent-teacher communication apps are bridging the gap
Not just private but even government schools in India are launching parent-teacher communication applications. Smartphone apps can be designed for sharing attendance, exam/assignment results, GPS location of the student, and even academic materials.
The app integrates with school ERP. So, administrators can also use the app for sending alerts concerning the status of their queries and complaints, pending school fees, library, and transport charges as well.
Thanks to the school attendance app, guardians can stay updated about their kid’s attendance without calling the school or personally meeting the tutors.
Would the system remain relevant in the post-COVID-19 world?
The attendance software or module in the ERP system can integrate with multiple other solutions, including the school LMS, online forums, and apps. It can be designed to track student’s login, as well as log out, and mark attendance for online lectures. Daily attendance, along with details for overall online login hours in the LMS, can be shared with teachers and parents. The data can help in determining the student’s engagement level during online classes. Put simply; attendance management solutions would become even more relevant in the post-COVID-19 era.
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