Student attendance is widely regarded as an important factor influencing engagement and academic success in engineering education, yet maintaining consistent onsite participation continues to pose challenges. At the same time, little is known about how attendance at different types of learning activities relates to performance within individual courses, particularly in the context of introductory engineering education where students form foundational study habits. This study examines attendance patterns in a first year, project based mechanical engineering course, using a QR based digital tool integrated into the learning management platform to document participation across lectures, workshops, supervision sessions, and project activities. The tool was introduced as a neutral documentation mechanism rather than an assessment component, allowing attendance to be recorded unobtrusively in both compulsory and voluntary activities. The results show clear variation in attendance across activity types, with high participation in early and mandatory sessions and somewhat lower attendance in later or skills-oriented activities. Analysis reveals a weak positive correlation between attendance and both individual and group performance, aligning with established findings in educational research. Subgroup analyses suggest that attendance–performance relationships may vary across age and gender groups, pointing to areas of interest for future work. Beyond the empirical results, the study demonstrates the practical feasibility of systematic attendance tracking on a large scale. Students showed no resistance to the tool, indicating that the method is straightforward to implement and well tolerated. The ability to visualize attendance across the course offers instructors a valuable basis for reflective teaching and for identifying which activities may benefit most from strong student presence.
