Originally Posted by js_paramedic_1979

Mike:

I'll start by saying that I'm in no way trying to be argumentative or rude.

I am in no way an expert on the school's policy on attendance, but I can comment on one reason that it's in place... In part, attendance is one of the issues that gave Caribbean schools a tough start from the beginning. In the words of the school's president, there were programs found to be giving out degrees to people who only sat for exams in the 70's. For example, you could be concurrently working in some other healthcare setting in the U.S. while attending medical school in the Caribbean. You would just need to fly down for exams. Apparently, governing bodies in the U.S. had a problem with this, and it eventually forced changes in the Caribbean shools' policies. As you know, Saba came along after these problems were repaired, but in an effort to maintain the shool's reputation, they have the attendance policy in place. With all of that said, there are other schools in the Caribbean who do not take attendance according to their students. For example, one Ross student talked of flying to Puerto Rico to study at Starbucks during the semester! I've heard that many of the larger schools would not be able to spend class time calling out students' names due to class size. Personally, I am happy with Saba, but this may be something to consider before starting if you feel that you do better studying on your own...