ATTENDANCE REPORTING USER GUIDE – October 2016

ATTENDANCE REPORTING
USER GUIDE
The Attendance Reporting facility enables you to view, monitor and analyse attendance and
checkpoint data that has been loaded into the central Student Attendance Monitoring (SAM)
system. It also enables you to set trigger points which are used to warn when an action may be
required. Reports are run using “prompts” to specify particular student groups to view.

REPORTS SEARCH
The reports screen summarises all the attendance data for students. There are three ways to access
Attendance Reporting:
1) Go direct via the web page: http://www.shef.ac.uk/attendance
2) Log into MUSE and go to the Staff Applications tab. In the “CIES Student, CIES Staff and Student
Attendance Monitoring” block, select “Student Attendance Monitoring”.
3) Alternatively, if you happen to be in CIES already, from the Main Menu, select Option 13
“Attendance Monitoring”.
From the Student Attendance Monitoring (SAM) home page click on the link to “Attendance
Reports”, then “Reports”.
There are various ways to search for the students:

• By Department
• By Module
• By Programme
• By Supervisor / Tutor

Search parameters available on this page are:

Student Level This is the study period a student is in. Level 1 (First year) students are
in period A, level 2 (second year) students are in period B, level 3 (third
year) students are in period C, etc. You may also select to see “All”
student levels. (*See note below).
Degree Class Selection for undergraduate, postgraduate taught or postgraduate
research student types. You may also select to see “All” student types.
Registration Status Changes the registration status group displayed (eg: students who are
attending or on LOA, who have completed, etc).
Show Attendance Data For This selection changes the time period of attendance data reported.
You can either report for the last twelve months, or by year (eg: 2011 =
academic year 2011/12, 2012 = academic year 2012/13, etc). (*See
note below).
Please note that registration year is not the same as academic year for
cross sessional students.
Sort Order Changes the order in which students are listed.
Grouping:

a) Group All Attendance Only the total attendance will be shown.

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b) Group Module Module attendance will be grouped but the report will still contain a
Attendance breakdown of other attendance records.

c) Show Individual Module A full breakdown of attendance by module will be displayed.

Details

Count Authorised Option to count authorised absences as either “Absent”, “Attended” or

Absences As to “Ignore” them. The selected option will be reflected in the figures
showing in the “Total Attendance” column of the report.
Options:

a) Only Show People With Will only show international students in the UK on a Tier 4 Student
CAS Numbers Visa, ie: who have a CAS number.

b) Only Show People Will only show students highlighted by the chosen trigger set (see
Hitting Trigger Points below).

c) Only Show People by Will only show students following programmes of study ‘owned’ by the
Home Department Department selected.

d) Only Show People Who
have Completed Their
Course
Trigger Set
Will only show students who have completed their programme of
study.
Trigger sets can be created in the triggers section of reporting. Trigger
sets define a set of trigger levels based on various rules. Default trigger
sets have been created based on Student Services recommendations
for reporting international students to UK Visas and Immigration.

* Note: Attendance Report data displays current students with attendance data corresponding to
the year that you select to view for those students, ie: running a report during 2012 and selecting
“Student Level” of D and a “Show Attendance Data For” year 2011 will show attendance data for
those Period D students in the previous year (2011), when they were Period C.

Alternatively, the Check point Follow Up Reports option will allow a single report to be run which
identifies:

• All CAS students with a red cross or amber exclamation mark

• All non-CAS students with two consecutive red crosses or exclamation marks
• All students where the check point has not been recorded (this will only work for
compulsory check points and not the optional ones)

The report generates a spreadsheet which can be sent out to departments to request further
information.

To do this, from the Student Attendance Monitoring (SAM) home page click on the link to
“Attendance Reports”, then “Check Point Follow Up Report”:

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How would you like to list Select the appropriate check point period
students:
Student level: You may run the reports by individual levels (A, B, C, etc) or select to
run “ALL” levels. (*See note below)
Registration Status: Select “Check Point Required”
Department: Select the department for which you wish to run an attendance report
Options: You may:

a) Check the box for ‘Only show people hitting trigger points’
b) Check the box for ‘include students who have completed their
course’

Click on “Search” once all criteria are selected.

REPORT COLUMNS
Once run, a report will provide attendance data in a table comprised of the following:

Surname The student’s surname. This can be clicked to go to the student’s CIES
profile. From here, click on the “Attendance” link to view a list of
attendance data (Single Student Attendance Report) for the student.
Forename Forename
CAS The student’s CAS number if they have one
Prog The programme of study that a student is studying.
Last Attended The last recorded attendance date for the student
Total Attendance Total of all attendance records. This can be clicked to get a full list of
the student’s attendance data (Single Student Attendance Report).
1 to 1 Attendance Attendance record from the 1 to 1 system (will only show if any option
other than “Group All Attendance” is selected).
Other Attendance Any attendance details which are not related to a module (will only
show if any option other than “Group All Attendance” is selected).
Module Attendance Attendance broken down by module (will only show if any option
other than “Group All Attendance” is selected.
Reg CP (Registration Check Automated check point record, indicated by green tick, is system
Point) generated when student becomes registered (Reg Status=FR,PR or
TEMP) within a window of time (UG/PGT - between 2nd Monday in July
and 3rd Monday in November; PGR – same dates or within one month
of start date). A red cross indicates student either not registered, or
did not register within automated registration check point window.
Latest 3 Check Points Check Point flags for the last 3 available check points. (Note: for
explanations of the five different Check Point Flag types please see the
separate Check Point Recording User Guide.)
Trigger Details If a trigger set has been used this column contains the description
associated with the trigger the student matched.
Reg Status The student’s registration status. (Note: If the option “Check Point
Required” is selected, the resulting table will include students with
registration status types FR, LOA, NE, PR, RESUB MINOR, RR, SU, SU
PENDING, TEMP, TO RESUBMIT, WU)
MOA The student’s mode of attendance.
Level The study period a student is in (eg: Level 1 = period A, Level 2 =

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period B, etc).
Tutor The student’s research supervisor, personal tutor or dissertation
supervisor, if it is recorded in CIS.
Department Contact Email link to primary contact in the department for student attendance
monitoring purposes. Can be used to email the named staff.
Student Email The email address of the student.

In addition, where there is a notes bubble attached to a students’ check point this means that
the student has been returned as not engaging ( ) or engagement is cause for concern ( ) and
that the departments has loaded further information on the specific concerns or the action taken to
address the concerns. These comments can be viewed by holding curser over the bubble icon.
These comments are reviewed by staff in the Student Progress and Engagement Team of the
Student Administration Service as part of their check point monitoring follow up procedures.

TRIGGERS

The triggers section allows you to setup rules for highlighting students who are missing attendance
monitoring points and include prompts for action. In the central Student Attendance Monitoring
system click on “Attendance Reports” then “Triggers”.

The first trigger point configuration page lists all the existing trigger sets available in your
department. These can be edited and deleted. There are also a number of standard trigger sets
which are managed centrally and will be of use to departments to assist with the monitoring and
review of SAM data and check points. These are:

As an example, academic departments may find it useful to run an Attendance Report using the
“<50% Attendance” and/or the “Missed Recent Interactions” triggers between monitoring Check
Points in order to identify students whose engagement might be of concern. This will enable them to
pick up non-engaging students earlier and take action.

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To create a new trigger set click the ‘Create New’ link. This opens the following page:

Enter an appropriate name in the first field for the “Trigger Set Name”. This will be the name
displayed on the reports trigger sets listing screen. The “Trigger Set Description” should be a longer
explanation of the purpose of the trigger set. Finally select whether this trigger set will only be used
in your department or if it should be available to every user of the Student Attendance Monitoring
system (only available to admin users).

The next step is to define the trigger points. These are listed in order of their priority, with a lower
number having a higher priority (eg: Trigger Level 1 will have priority over Trigger Level 2). Clicking
the checkbox next to a trigger displays the possible trigger options that can be selected (as shown in
the following diagram):

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Under “Trigger Level #” first enter a “Description” of the trigger. This will be displayed in the reports
when the trigger has matched a student. The next option is the colour to highlight the student report
line in when a trigger has been matched.

The trigger is made up of any number of the available options. The only required option is the
number range of monitoring records the trigger relates to. Set the minimum and maximum numbers
for the range appropriately, depending on what you want to achieve by using this trigger set.

Ticking the checkboxes next to the other trigger options will add them. These are:

Consecutive Absences Multiple absences with no attendances interspersed between

Missed Interactions
Percentage Missed Interactions
Missed Nearly Consecutive
Interactions
Most Recent Interactions
Missed Over a Period
Most Recent Check Point
Missed
Most Recent Check Point Not
Recorded
Registration Checkpoint Not
Recorded
them
The total number of missed interactions in the year
The percentage of attendance monitoring interactions a student
has missed
A number of missed interactions close together with some
attendances interspersed between them
Consecutively missed interactions up to the current date
Missing a number of interactions over a number of weeks
At the last check point the student was marked as not attending
The last check point was not recorded by the department
The system generated registration checkpoint has not been
recorded.

If multiple options are ticked a student’s attendance must match all the criteria specified by the
options for the trigger to highlight that student with the selected highlight colour.

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