Attendance and the Ministry of Education

Staff exploit loopholes in MoE attendance system says the Khaleej Times. Too bad the staff cannot be trusted simply to behave as professionals. It will be quite a trick to get to the point where the Ministry has a work environment where human interaction supports a professional attitude amongst all the staff. KT reports that the Ministry is instead for more technogy to monitor physical presence. Real presence, and consequences for the lack thereof, is another matter.

Here's a technological innovation to consider. If it works for students perhaps it will work on administrators. But somehow I doubt it will get you what you want: you get what you pay for as is explained over at Newmark's Door. As I was saying -- measuring physical presence is not the same thing as measuring presence.

UPDATE, 20Aug. Gulf News also covers the MoE story:

The statement follows reports unearthing an alleged ring of staff cheating the ministry by taking turns swiping each other's cards when entering or leaving the office, allowing the others to get unauthorised free time.
. . .
"It is true some irresponsible employees have misused their swipe cards, especially over the summer months when the workload is light," said the official, who asked not to be named.
In the report, it was recommended some employees who claim to 'forget' using their swipe cards must be closely watched.