Good morning! We are exploring different attendance policies to implement for our students during their clinical time. Right now our attendance policy states that an accumulation of two absences will result in a written warning from the DCE and the accumulation of 2 written warnings will require a meeting with the DCE and PD, the meeting may result in dismissal from the program.
The problem that I am finding is that this policy is too vague. I was wondering if you could share your attendance policies or what you have found works best with your students to assure that they are going to clinical as scheduled. Do you deduct points from their grade? Dismiss them from the program after so many occurrences/absences? Right now we consider an occurrence/absence as any time a student does not attend clinical on their scheduled day, even if we are notified ahead of time that they need to adjust their schedule.
Also- does your policy address tardiness and what happens when your student it tardy? What is considered tardy (do you allow a few min window)?
Thank you in advance for your help!
Nikki Dato, BS, RRT, RCP
Director of Clinical Education
Southern State Community College