Apprentice Attendance Monitoring from January 2025

This document details specific attendance monitoring requirements for apprentice courses

There are links within the document to other more general guidance about attendance monitoring

Regulatory background to attendance monitoring

Regular attendance at taught sessions is crucial as it ensures apprentices gain the necessary skills and knowledge to complete their apprenticeship successfully.  Employers and training providers are required to monitor the attendance of apprentices to ensure they are meeting the necessary training hours and making progress in their apprenticeship.  Employers and training providers must comply with ESFA funding rules and Ofsted requirements, which include maintaining accurate records of attendance and training hours.  The apprenticeship training provider accountability framework provides more detailed information on expectations of providers for attendance monitoring.  In addition, some apprentices will need to adhere to professional and regulatory body requirements (PSRB) regarding attendance.

For on campus delivery, the standard Touchpoint monitoring system should be used for all sessions.

A detailed document covering all aspects of touchpoint attendance monitoring, including how timetables need to be set up is available here. If you encounter any problems in using the system, or physically with any of the touchpoint card readers in the teaching spaces and you haven’t found an answer in the details document, you should contact the Registry Systems Team and timetabling. They will assist you with day-to-day issues and more complex technical problems.

Attendance monitoring for campus sessions

The standard Touchpoint monitoring system should be used for all campus-based sessions

• Please make sure apprentices are aware they must bring cards and scan them at the correct time and room for each session
• Check that your timetabled events have been set up correctly and that any changes to the venue/ time and any cancellations are reported to timetabling within 48 hours.

Checking and editing attendance information in Sonic

• You must use ‘Real time’ checking of Sonic records at the start of each teaching session to check which apprentices have scanned in. If the room does not have a touchpoint scanner you will need to manually record attendance.
• You can use Sonic to check attendance for individual sessions, modules and overall attendance for individual apprentices. 
• If the attendance record is incorrect, you must manually edit the record.  Ideally this should be completed within the teaching session.  If this is not possible, the record must be amended within 24 hours of the session.  Attendance for apprentices who have forgotten their ID card can be added manually through Sonic. 
• Detailed staff guide to attendance and Sonic is linked here.

Online sessions

• If the session is taking place online the session will not show in the Sonic system, instead a manual record must be taken to show whether attendance has occurred. 
• If the online sessions are MANDATORY we need to add the information into our engagement records. Please liaise with your local management team to confirm who will compile an Online Attendance Record weekly for each apprentice with mandatory online events. This must include the following information combined for all the modules they are taking:
  • • The apprentices’ student ID number
    • Which week the data is for (date of the Monday the week starts)
  • • Number of mandatory online sessions attended
    • Number of mandatory online sessions that should have been attended

• Once manual records have been collated, they must be uploaded to the apprentice attendance teams channel. Please liaise with your local management team to confirm who will do this. For access to this contact Dr Val Cox (apx253@coventry.ac.uk).
• Note that these records will be added to summary engagement information provided for academic staff, HOWEVER they will not be in the attendance information visible to students via NOVA.

If apprentice students are not yet enrolled

• In the eventuality that apprentices are not yet enrolled a manual record must be taken to show that attendance has occurred for all sessions. 
• When students are enrolled their attendance for sessions pre-enrolment can be manually edited to show the ones they did attend for the previous weeks- note the system will allow you to edit records up to 6 weeks in the past. (Please also keep the manual records in case of any technical issues with the edited records or if the sessions do not show on the students’ records in Sonic.)
• Students may not be able to see these pre-enrolement weeks when they view their attendance on NOVA, but the information will be included in downloads used to provide summary engagement data for academic teams.

Student view of attendance information

Apprentices can view their own attendance information using Nova

• Apprentice facing information for this is linked here

Possible issues

• The detailed document includes a table of common issues and actions that should be taken- linked here

Attendance fraud

• This includes behaviour such as an apprentice asking another apprentice to scan their card, so it appears they attended sessions, or apprentices scanning their card and then leaving the venue without attending the session
• A detailed document about how to identify and manage this problem is available here

Summary engagement data

• SPIO provide a weekly summary of engagement, including use of AULA and attendance recorded via touchpoint.
• This includes course/ level/ intake summaries to identify areas of concern
• Data is produced for individual apprentices.  College/School and apprenticeship management teams will be working with SPIO to agree how this information will be made available to use as part of the broader attendance review and monitoring processes for apprentice courses.

Key links

The apprenticeship training provider accountability framework

A detailed document covering all aspects of touchpoint attendance monitoring, including how timetables need to be set up is available here

A detailed document about how to identify and manage attendance fraud is available here