Imagine being legally responsible for being too tired to get up for class, missing the T, going home for the weekend or being just plain lazy. At Oxford University in England, under a new obligatory contract system, students could face legal and academic repercussions for skipping too much class.

Oxford recently announced that it is requiring students to sign a contract that makes attending classes mandatory. Although, most Boston University professors think Oxford has gone overboard.

The contract devised by the Oxford administration is designed to protect the school for students who might take legal action against the institution, blaming their poor grades on failings by the university.

College of Communication Dean John Schulz said there is a high correlation between students who do not attend class and low test scores and grades. However, he said, there is not – and should not be – a uniform attendance policy in COM.

“I take it as the policy of the professor whether attendance should be graded or just expected of the student,” he said.

Schulz said he is surprised by the new Oxford policy because when he was studying at Oxford, attendance at lectures was not required.

“Typically what would happen is you would just have to attend the tutorials,” he said, “which are between a professor and one or two other students.”

School of Management Undergraduate Programs Director Norman Blanchard said that while SMG does not have a broad policy on attendance, the majority of professors make it clear in the course syllabus what is expected of the students.

“The school does not enforce an attendance policy,” he said. “We leave it up to the faculty members to pursue their own policies and enforce specific consequences for attendance.”

Both Schulz and Blanchard said they do not feel the need for a specific attendance policy for their schools because in general, students are motivated and understand that attendance leads to better understanding of course material and better grades.

“COM students are quite responsible and understand that missing classes can affect their grades,” Schulz said. “The standards for students coming here are so high that it is rare that we have a problem.”

Professors and teaching assistants in various fields decide on a class by class basis whether grading attendance or even taking it to begin with is necessary.

Political science department teaching assistant Deniz Gungen, who has worked with several professors, said for all the classes he has worked with, a daily attendance sign-in sheet has been a part of the class and a percentage of the students’ grades.

Journalism professor Christopher Daly said he does not take attendance because he finds it cumbersome and time consuming. Daly said he feels it is the responsibility of the students to come to class because they want to “seek knowledge.”

“Students who don’t come to class are only punishing themselves,” he said.

Daly said he opposes the idea of BU instituting a contract similar to the new Oxford policy because it is up to the student to be responsible for their own education.

“Most education is self-education,” he said. “Also, I don’t want people to be here because they have to, I want them to be here because they choose to be here.”

While academic departments allow professors to set their own attendance policies, many of the classes offered through the Physical Education and Recreation Department have a limit on how many classes students can miss.

Boxing and kickboxing instructor Jim O’Brien said the policy for attendance in fitness classes is different than academic ones because many of the fitness classes have a set curriculum that follow a timeline of skills to accomplish. According to O’Brien, this does not allow for many absences.

“Typically, a student is not supposed to miss more than three classes, or they have to make it up in another class or take an incomplete,” he said.

Students at BU said they feel class attendance should be up to the student, and that in college, students are at an age where their education is their own responsibility.

“It’s your choice whether you go to class or not,” Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences freshman Allison Gorsky said.

Gorsky said while not all of her professors take attendance, she has noticed that students are more likely to come to class if the professor does take attendance.

CAS freshman Wesley Furste said he does not think the university needs to enforce an attendance contract because it should be up to students where they study.

“If you can study better on your own rather than have to go sit through a boring lecture, then why go?” he said.

CAS sophomore Megan Strong said it is not up to the university to enforce mandatory class attendance.

“If you don’t go to class, it is your own fault if you get a bad grade, not the school’s,” she said.

University Professor’s Program sophomore Andra Brosy said she feels that by the time students reach college they should be mature enough to be able to “handle their own affairs.”

Brosy said this type of policy would be “unrealistic and not necessary.”

“This isn’t high school,” she said.