Unfortunately we can’t cater to the fringe cases. We need to make this system simple for the largest audience and beneficial for both parties.
On top of that we need it simple to maintain because we are dealing with volunteer labor
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21.4% means that roughly 60% of all the money DMS commits to the Honorarium program comes back to DMS as committee funds. That is consistent with the numbers @Photomancer has conveyed. It also means that the bulk of the honorarium program directly funds DMS committees. The remaining 40% go to volunteers who spend a fair bit of their time teaching (therefore helping us meet our education priority). Does anyone really see this system as a problem?
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@AlexRhodes, were these two “19” groups the SAME classes? E.g. were the 19 classes which donated their honorarium the same 19 which did not fill out an attendance? If so, it sounds like there might be a training issue WRT the handling of honorarium-donated classes.
I know it’s also possible to set up classes for which NO honorarium is requested: these have lower hoops to jump through in order to get approved compared to honorarium classes (which require 240 hour advance notice, 72 hour review period, et al https://dallasmakerspace.org/wiki/Rules_and_Policies#Honorarium), even when the honorarium is being donated (which would eliminate the W-9 requirements, etc.).
Is it possible that some of the 19 classes w/out attendance fell into this lower-threshold category?
Edit: fixed quote attribution.
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I think that the first thing to see what classes the no show are mostly being in
lecture classes, hard to get into classes, tech classes, art classest in classes,
Lets say that they are in the hard to get in classes, Ig may be tha folks register
when there is an opening without checking with things like work and family plans
Exactly…and I’d venture I’m not the only one who pays to drive to the space. The wee honorarium ensures that instructors aren’t operating in the negative to teach. What that should tell you isn’t that only 21% care it’s that 79% would not keep teaching without it.
(FWIW in the world outside DMS at minimum I make around $35 hour for private lessons per person and $125 a PD so I promise if anyone is in it for the dollars at the space they’re an exception)
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Isn’t the concern based on the amount of people who no-show without canceling their reservation? Considering you can cancel almost to the time of the event there should be minimal excuses for no-shows.
I have to conclude that these two instances of 19 are different and coincidence. I taught two classes in June; attendance was reported for both; the entire $100 goes to committees and they are not listed.
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This class was cancelled.
The instructor is new. He was expecting a confirmation message when his class was published. When he did not receive it, he presumed that the class was rejected, so he did not show up to teach it.
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When the instructor realizes there is not three to make honorarium, there is no incentive to take attendance anyway.
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Taking attendance should be a required item IF you want to teach at DMS. Not having attendance information skews all reporting.
It horrifies and disappoints me that people are failing to do paperwork to get honorarium for themselves and a committee. Any instructor should have this mental rule: “Do not leave the building until you have completed the documentation to get paid.” Just a question, from the DMS side, is there anything more we can do to facilitate people doing their paperwork to get paid?
That 501©3 non-profit status, we are maintaining that status by teaching yet are not requiring class attendance information. It is a gray state that should be addressed.
I think we have plenty of proof we are teaching enough. I am worried about the appearance of mismanagement if auditors start drilling down on class detail.
Beware the Law of Unintended Consequences.
If we make it too difficult to teach classes, there will be fewer classes.
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I want to point out something, the report attendence button is off at the far right of the
attendence screen, that is why I missed it and I know someone else
that missed it on her phone,
You can mark attendence but if you don t click on that, it doesn t report it, Can it be moved to right below tha attendence where it is hard to overlook?
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I like the idea of electronic check in both for easy action and it would be no burden on instructors. The big brains who will wrangle this software idea will have to figure out feasibility and cost.
I have been a classroom instructor. If you are there with your roll sheet, as people come in you get their names and mark them present. This is not a huge burden. Even if it is manual, it might be a total of 5 minutes while everyone is arriving for class and people are getting settled. Or people sign by their names as they come into the class. Personally, I liked to “take” roll so I knew people’s names and why they had come to that class, I did a very light interview as people were settling in. “What do you want to learn today?”
The post earlier by Alex about how many people fail to submit payment paperwork, still leaves me stunned.
I disagree that giving instructors 1 more thing they have to is too much.
I agree with you on NOT making a class an ordeal for an instructor or a student… That is not excellent.
This was my Thurs night class darn it doesn t shoe it as I see itn
the mark attendence button is off the right of the mark attendance,
It is easy to miss, more so if you have a magnified screen
I think that folks just don t see it, On a game I play there is a save button
that causes a lot of issues, because it gets missed a lot
Name Attended
Jessica Bierk Absent
Nancee Heim Present
Carine Tsongas Present
Anjali Jadeja Present
beth holen Present
Almeda R For Present
Charlene Pamplin Present
Attendance is closed for this class.
It is trivial to report attendance folks, it takes seconds. I’m in the habit of doing it live at the beginning of class. Read the names, check the boxes, click the button. Run through at the end for folks who showed up late. You might forget or the system might be down but, please, lets not spend a bunch of timing trying to argue it’s a difficult process, it’s just not. Can’t find the save button that first time? Sure but that’s a one-time thing. You know where it is now, time to move on.
That being said, I don’t think we can make instructors take attendance if they don’t want to, auditors be damned. It’s hard enough getting people to teach. The sad thing though is they are leaving money on the table for the committee and possibly themselves. I’m filing that in the not being excellent to others category but we just need to make sure they realize that and the rest is out of our hands.
Jay’s 2 cents; take it or file it in the round file 
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Re taking attendance on low classes
On the flip side, the thing of not filling out attendance on a class that wound up too low to make honorarium (or a non-honorarium class or event) might be simply “why bother?”
Bill had mentioned lack of incentive above. I suspect it’s closer to ignorance that anyone would care. It’s not like it’s a big hassle to do. Three minutes (maybe) and click a button. Done.
Really, knowing that it matters for analysis numbers, that’s enough incentive for me. I’ve been guilty of blowing off attendance on events (non-honorarium to start with) since I thought no one cared. I am pretty sure I have skipped attendance before on a class that wound up low after no-shows flaking. Still taught of course, but didn’t make a special effort to take attendance. Honorarium classes that make, I’m pretty careful about attendance
Now that it seems useful (useful breakdown above @AlexRhodes, thx) I’ll be more consistent on ALL the classes, not just the ones that’ll involve finance.
It might just simply be a matter of getting the word out to instructors to please take attendance whether honorarium is involved or not.
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I havent taken attendance on events either, didn t know it was important
I disagree that giving instructors 1 more thing they have to is too much.
I would say that depends on the class. We don’t request honorariums for blacksmithing. We haven’t for years even after adding instructors. We also do not take attendance. It is already difficult enough for us to get the equipment setup in time for the class. We can’t just stand by the door and ask people to fill out an attendance form- we don’t even have a door. Our list of prep is already long and involved, and the instructors show up as early as an hour before class to make sure things are done near the start time. It might be one thing, but that one thing is on top of a list of a dozen other things for us.
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If you have never taken roll, how do you know it is too much?
If there is too much to do, in the restaurant business, that is called “being in the weeds”. There is an easy solution, ask for help from those coming to blacksmithing class.
There are benefits from having good data on classes. There are potential issues from having no data or bad data.
Do you really want to take the position bad data or no data is good for DMS?
A manager early in my career said if you bring me a problem, bring me at least 2 solutions. What are your alternate solutions to taking roll?
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FWIW I taught two classes last night. 7 no shows between them not counting last minute cancellations. Because two students stayed from the first and another came to the wrong session honorarium wasn’t lost. However the class count was registered well over 3 so it was irritating to say the least to know only a perfect storm kept the no shows from costing me $100. Certainly enough frequency at this point to make me reconsider teaching at DMS in general and especially teaching free classed
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