After the end of classes several years ago, I went to a very interesting talk from a professor in our department on the utter failure of a similar sort of experiment. This case was a bit more complicated, but mandatory attendance was a part of it. Students were required to purchase "clickers", which would be used to answer multiple choice questions in class on lecture material. Scores on these quizes, along with attendance, would factor into their final grade. Students were, of course, quite pissed at having to shell out another $60 for something they resented in the first place. Some students would give their clicker to another student and have that student answer for them. Many students came to class and made their displeasure subtley known. They'd talk during class, rustle the newspaper, and just generally provide background noise and distraction since they didn't want to be attending the class in the first place (after all, the lectures were all available online shortly after class). Year-end reviews of the course totally reamed the clicker and were *vehemently* resentful, especially of the mandatory attendance. The professor concluded that although class attendance did increase, the increase came from students that the professor really didn't want to be attending the class anyways since they were disruptive. You DO NOT want students attending class who do not want to be there! The talk ended with his conclusion that they would never try this again. Then I hear a few years later that the same professor had started using the clickers again [incredulous face-palm].
