By Andres Gonzalez | Contributing Writer
Adjusting to a college lifestyle after going through high-school is something most students look forward to doing. College provides a whole new world of opportunities, freedoms, and change when students move into their freshman year. While everyone’s college experience is different, one aspect that almost every college student would be able to relate to is skipping class. Almost anyone you ask currently attending FIU will probably tell you that they have skipped class at least once, but why exactly is it so common?
The first reason, which I personally relate to and believe to be the biggest tell, is the amount of freedom students gain access to. Part of this is because college in general does not have nearly as many strict boundaries as high school. On top of this, at least in my experience, most professors I have taken at FIU are not very concerned about attendance, very rarely making it mandatory. This gives students total autonomy of their days and in their eyes, if showing up is not enforced, then there are no direct repercussions.
Another factor than can play into students skipping classes is excessive workload and responsibilities. Often times, if students are overwhelmed, especially if they are working a job while attending school, missing classes can give them the extra time they need to catch up on assignments or to just get more rest. In addition, FIU’s use of canvas can serve as extra motivation to miss classes, due to most assignments and class presentations now being accessible online.
Online accessibility itself is another huge factor that plays into all the reasons why one would skip classes. In terms of attendance not being mandatory, studying from home over canvas can give students the tool to study in their own time, potentially also saving time, rather than spending longer sitting in a classroom. Sitting in a classroom can be made even less appealing if lectures turn out to be boring and redundant, encouraging the online shortcut. This route potentially has even less repercussions when it comes to missing classes, as if students are responsible and keep up with the class material over canvas, then they feel as if they have less of a need to show up.
A reasoning that also might be worth mentioning are small factors that might prove going to class a certain day is too much of an inconvenience. These factors can include minor illnesses, difficulty parking, heavy traffic, and long commutes. These issues might obviously cause someone to outright skip class, but even if a student tries to get past them, they will almost always result in being late. Even though being late isn’t technically skipping class, being too late can make it not worth showing up anymore and just skipping anyways, which is something I have been guilty of multiple times. These minor inconveniences eventually stack up, especially considering that FIU has given many students issues with the burden of finding parking more often than not.
Realistically, students skipping class is a combination of all of these factors I brought up, and most likely many more that I failed to mention. Combinations of freedom, stress, online accessibility, inconvenient circumstances, and much more all work in tandem to make skipping class seem more reasonable. The fact that there were so many reasons more or less shows why it is so common for FIU students to end up skipping their classes.
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The opinions presented on this page do not represent the views of the PantherNOW Editorial Board. These views are separate from editorials and reflect the perspectives of contributing writers and/or university community members.
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