Why track attendance and services?
There are several reasons why you should track attendance and activities at your center. Here are just a few:
 | It’s required: Your
current grant (or the one you are seeking) requires you to report on the
attendance and use of services. Also, your state or federal agency may
require you to submit quarterly or annual statistical reports. |
| Improve services:
Tracking will help you improve the services your center offers. For example,
by knowing which services are popular and which are not, you’ll be able to
put more resources into the most-used services. You can also investigate why
some services are not used, and either enhance them or drop them all
together. |
| Promote your center:
Most likely, there are many students who need your services but haven’t
heard about them. By monitoring attendance you will know which classes and
colleges your visitors are coming from and which services they are using.
You can then advertise these services to other students in the same classes,
thus increasing the traffic to your center. |
| Report on attendance:
Some instructors need to know the total time their students spend in
tutoring sessions. Perhaps they allocate a certain number of points for
attendance. Or in the case of a borderline student, an instructor may use
the reports to evaluate the student’s effort. |
| Establish usage patterns:
This is useful in many cases. For example, you might be considering closing
the lab on Friday afternoons, or opening it on the weekends. Knowing the
usage pattern of the center is useful in making these decisions and in
making a case with upper management. |
