Class No-Shows (most un-excellent!)

to make something valuable, limit it. If you want people to be more careful about no shows, then limit the number of classes they can take per month, if they don’t show up for a class they will have “spent” one of their 5 classes per month on something. Just an idea.

I don t like that idea at all,

currently people have an unlimited number of classes they can register for, so for them their is no cost.

But… You just said you recently missed a class because you were IN the space and didn’t want to get up…

But you don’t want to let the teachers limit their class or charge a small fee so the student is at least slightly invested…

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Five classes is way too small a number. Take someone that takes the Welding safety
and the the MIG and TIG classes that is 3 right there. Learning the HAAS is 3 classes.

Maybe if you are have a certain number of no shows, then you get the limit, That would not
penalize other folks that show up

We made it hard for folks to just show up for a class, and now we have the no show issue,
Maybe we encourage more teacher to allow folks to register at the time of the
class, or maybe tell folks that if you didn t register for a class, show up 5=10 before and the can
take it

May be we should look at the classes where there are being lots of no shows. I am not seeingthat in jewelry. There were several in the embroidery class bu one
was sick I know

No I don t like fees because that can be a hardship for some, I have even seen that wiht m
$5 material fee

Let s figure out a way to encourage folks to show up. A carrot and not a stick
.
Weaving is a very consuming activity and I had to finish what I was doing that day
because the warp was going to be cut off the loom and it was taking ame longer thant
I had expected. With my site issues lots of things take longer but oten until I
work on the I don t know how much longer Now that I usually have my laptop with me,
I can cancel (I can t see my phone well enough to do that from it)

I am probably going to regret asking this but what possibly could we have done to encourage you to get out of a chair to go in a class when you were in the building…

Personally I think it’s an issue with people like you that are doing this to teachers. The penalty should not be on teachers it should be on people to lazy to show up.

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Be careful Robert,

Lazy doesn’t fit here. Instead it was a value judgement. The example was skipping the class not to be lazy, but rather to finish a project. That said the action showed a pretty low value of the teacher’s time and also if the class was limited seating a low value of the opportunity as it may take the opportunity away from others.

This is the exact behavior I feel is an abuse of our system currently. I think we can agree this isn’t an action that we want to support our students feeling is acceptable.

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How about a $5 ($10? $15?) refundable attendance fee - you get your fee back if you show up for the class. Refund could be cash, credit, or coupon for future attendance fee.

Penalizes no-show-ers, but only a minor impact for folks who do show up.

Fee should be high enough to encourage attendance, while not so high that unforseen circumstances (e,g, flat tire) doesn’t cause huge anxiety.

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I like the idea Mike,

My concerns are that even small amounts of money can lead to irrational reactions, especially when dealing with keeping track of it.

Secondly, I think setting the value as low as $5, $10, $15 may be too low. A class with honorarium has a value to DMS of more than $100. $50 goes to a committee to improve DMS, while the other $50 goes to the instructor who often donates it to the committee to help improve DMS. That money is invested in tools, consumables, and improvements that are often supported by free labor of volunteers. So there is quite a lot of value to DMS for the class. Just looking at the $100 the honorarium sets with the 3 seat requirement, puts the value per seat at $34 per seat. But, to be honest, if you are the no show that takes a class below the threshold you just cost the whole $100.

But, if we put a minimum seat availability requirement on a class of 5 seats, then 3 no shows would cover the honorarium for the teacher. The catch being dealing with No Show complaining and dealing with teachers that flake. We need equal responsibility at that point.

Crap can of worms open fully now, but maybe we can come to a solution here.

I like this, but if we could implement it, I would say members get the fee refunded. This is not intended as a penalty for non-members - it is intended as a perq for members.

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Perhaps we could implement the $5 for members as something we bill their account for if they don’t show. That would eliminate the overhead of charging, then refunding.

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So I just wanted to bring a little bit of data to this conversation. I just looked at June, 2017.

We had a total of 97 classes in June that had some sort of honorarium attached to them from 42 unique teachers/sponsors.

19 of the 97 classes chose for the whole $100 to go to the committee.
Those 19 classes were from 9 unique teachers.

These 19 classes left money on the table because they didn’t fill out the attendance sheet.
06-26-2017 7:00 PM Jewelry Sawing and Piercing
06-14-2017 7:00 PM Woodshop Basics
06-22-2017 7:00 PM Intro to Bench Top Sherline Mill
06-23-2017 11:00 AM Intro to Bench Top Sherline Mill
06-28-2017 7:00 PM Intro to Bench Top Sherline Mill
06-24-2017 1:00 PM Vinyl Cutter & Button Maker
06-30-2017 7:30 PM Advanced EVA foamsmithing with Bryce Eden
06-26-2017 1:00 PM 3D Printer Basics
06-30-2017 12:00 PM Special FX make-up 101
06-30-2017 6:00 PM Special FX make-up 201
06-29-2017 6:00 PM Advanced 3D Printing - Simplify 3D and the Printrbot Simple Metal
06-13-2017 7:00 PM HAAS Training Part 1: CAD/CAM
06-20-2017 6:00 PM Introduction To Managing Virtualized Infrastructures
06-10-2017 9:00 AM Intermediate Metal Lathe: Thread Turning
06-10-2017 11:30 AM Intermediate Metal Lathe: Thread Turning
06-17-2017 9:00 AM Intermediate Metal Lathe: Thread Turning
06-17-2017 11:00 AM Intermediate Metal Lathe: Thread Turning
06-15-2017 8:00 PM Automotive Lift Class
06-24-2017 6:00 PM Creating Cat6 Patch Cables

We allow people one freebie forgiveness for this as it adds more work for finance.

Only 2 classes showed an attendance taken that didn’t meet the minimum.

Really the attendance is the smaller problem, it seems the bigger problem is teachers putting in their attendance within 24 hours of the class.

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@AlexRhodes, you are focusing solely on the Honorarium/financial aspect of no-shows.

I believe you also need to consider the impact of no-shows on members who couldn’t take the class because the signup list was full. IMHO, this lost opportunity cost, especially for popular, gateway classes like Woodshop Basics is at least as big a problem as reaching the honorarium size minimum. Even when the honorarium is paid out, if there are one or two no-shows that’s one or two members who have to wait another week (or three+) before said gateway class can be taken.

A more interesting metric, if it is available, is to compare the class size to the attendance list size for classes which were full when scheduled. This would get a better indication of the no-show rate, although standby/walk-in replacements would bias the attendance list size upwards.

Edit: I forgot to say “thanks” for sharing the metrics you collected: THANKS!

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I agree that there are lost opportunities and one way that has worked for Woodshop Basics is to have that minimum cost. that $5 has significantly dropped the no show rate. I remember I would have 2 people in a class sometimes but since we added the cost I can only think of 2 classes where I even had 1 no show. As much as people hate to hear it, just a small cost will help with no shows.

I will look into more metrics but if people don’t take attendance it skews the numbers. So I will look at dropping the classes with “0” attendance and go from there.

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You may also want to cross reference which classes were private fees. I saw at least a few on there that I know were paid through Event brite and was always told that you didn’t need to mark attendance unless there was honorarium involved

I wonder can we just do a “credit” when membership is in good standing each month to give the first class as a freebie (the $10 or whatever to take a class) A member who shows and is timely would have the financial hardship mentioned not be a factor but would still be penalized like everyone else if they continued to flake and register for things

@Cairenn_Day the ability to delay registration is an option in the calendar system. For some mediums where stuff has to be prepared I can see where the advanced closing is beneficial. I know you contribute so much to the space but if you really have that much trouble making classes then wait to register for them?

The classes I listed requested honorarium. Even if they have an eventbrite, we still need an attendance taken for honorarium.

I would encourage all teachers, regardless of honorarium, to take attendance. That attendance helps us in situations like these where we want to compare. It just makes our data more complete for decision making.

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What about, instead of a fee that needs to be refunded if you attended it be tracked with some type of token? You are allotted <however many tokens deemed an acceptable amount of no-shows per month). Tokens are only "redeemed " if you miss a class you are registered to attend. Once you are out of tokens you can not register/attend a class that month.

Wow, those numbers are kind of eye opening to me. That’s much lower than I would have expected, since folks like to say how often a committee gets the full $100 for classes. 19.6% of the time isn’t very often.

Edit - And only 9 out of 42 teachers for 21.4%

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My big problem is having to have my hubby drive me. I when he is not feeling well or the weather is dicey don t want him driving. Add to that age for me also, I am sometimes just too pooped to come,
I eill for classes that I REALLY want of need, but ones that are more just fun, I will hesitate

I am more thinking about folks that have to work late some nights and they either have to register and hope they don t or they wait late to see if they can get there

It does depend on the class