> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.bizaxl.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Sessions and Attendance

> Schedule class sessions with automatic online meeting links, mark attendance as present, absent, late, or excused, and let attendance feed each student's grade.

Sessions are the individual meetings of a class. Each session can carry an online meeting link and, afterwards, a recording. For every session you record attendance: who was present, absent, late, or excused. Attendance is not just a register - it feeds directly into each student's grade.

***

## Who Uses This Feature

| Role                        | What They Do                                                       |
| --------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| **Teacher**                 | Schedules and updates sessions, marks and revises attendance.      |
| **Classroom Administrator** | Manages sessions and attendance across all classes.                |
| **Student**                 | Joins sessions via the meeting link and sees their own attendance. |

***

## Before You Start

You need an **Active classroom** with a roster. Sessions attach to the classroom; attendance attaches to a session and to each student on the roster.

***

## Scheduling Sessions

Sessions for a recurring class are generated ahead of time, so you rarely create them one at a time. Once generated, each scheduled session receives an online meeting link automatically, and you can adjust individual sessions as plans change.

<Steps>
  <Step title="Generate the schedule">
    Regenerate sessions for the classroom to materialise the upcoming meetings.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Let meeting links attach">
    Scheduled sessions receive their online meeting link automatically; you do not paste links by hand.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Adjust a session">
    Update a session's status, notes, or meeting link if a specific class changes.
  </Step>
</Steps>

### Field Guide - Session

| Field            | Description / Purpose                                                   |
| ---------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Classroom**    | The class this session belongs to. Required.                            |
| **Status**       | The session state: Scheduled, Held, Cancelled, or Rescheduled.          |
| **Meeting link** | The online meeting link, attached automatically for scheduled sessions. |
| **Notes**        | Free notes about the session.                                           |

### The Session Lifecycle

```mermaid theme={null}
%%{init: {'theme':'base','themeVariables':{'primaryColor':'#14f1b1','primaryBorderColor':'#14f1b1','lineColor':'#14f1b1'}}}%%
flowchart LR
    S[Scheduled] --> H[Held]
    S --> C[Cancelled]
    S --> R[Rescheduled]
```

* **Scheduled**: the session is planned and has (or will get) a meeting link.
* **Held**: the class took place.
* **Cancelled**: the class did not happen.
* **Rescheduled**: the class was moved to another time.

***

## Marking Attendance

<Steps>
  <Step title="Open the attendance page">
    Go to `/classroom/{code}/attendance` and pick the session to mark.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Mark each student">
    On `/classroom/{code}/attendance/{session}`, set each student to Present, Absent, Late, or Excused. The list is your class roster.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Save">
    Save the register. Attendance for the whole session is recorded in one action.
  </Step>
</Steps>

### Field Guide - Attendance

| Field       | Description / Purpose                              |
| ----------- | -------------------------------------------------- |
| **Session** | The class meeting the attendance is for. Required. |
| **Student** | The person being marked. Required.                 |
| **Status**  | Present, Absent, Late, or Excused.                 |

<Info>
  Where a session is held online, attendance can be seeded from the meeting record and then revised by hand. If you have adjusted a student's attendance and want to return to the automatically-derived value, revert that student to the auto value.
</Info>

***

## Attendance Feeds the Grade

Attendance is one of the inputs to a student's grade. When you mark or change a student's attendance status, that student's grade snapshot recomputes automatically against the classroom's grade scheme. You do not run a separate calculation. See [Grading](/education/e-classroom/grading) for how the weighting works.

***

## Upstream and Downstream

* **Upstream (must exist first)**: an Active classroom with a roster.
* **Downstream (this enables)**: attendance records feed grades; held sessions produce recordings (see [Recordings](/education/e-classroom/recordings)).

***

## Best Practices

* Let the schedule generate sessions rather than creating them individually: this keeps meeting links and recordings wired up correctly.
* Mark attendance promptly after each session so grades stay current.
* Use **Excused** rather than **Absent** for approved absences, since the two can be weighted differently by the grade scheme.
* If an online session's auto-attendance looks wrong, revise by hand, and revert to auto only when you want the derived value back.