Attendance and Exam Performance at University

Marburger (2006) explored the link between absenteeism and exam performance by assessing the impact on absenteeism of removing a university wide policy of mandatory attendance for a single class. His results indicate that while an attendance policy has a strong impact on reducing absenteeism the link between absenteeism and exam performance is weak.This paper presents an alternative exploration into the link between absenteeism and exam performance by assessing the impact of implementing a module-specific attendance policy. Our results suggest the link between absenteeism and exam performance is strong, and that student-specific factors are important, including revision strategies and peer group effects. These results question the uniformity of the relationship between attendance and exam performance.