Taking school attendance has long been a simple affair: teachers scanning their classrooms for missing faces, noting absences in a book or computer log.

But one school in Karlovy Vary, west Bohemia, has already made plans to replace traditional roll calls with a system that will register students' attendance by having them scan personal electronic identification cards, beginning in January. Not only will the school's database instantaneously know who has arrived and who is truant, but concerned parents will be allowed to receive an SMS every day when their children check into school.

A similar system uses fingerprint scans to register student attendance.

At least a dozen other Czech schools are considering adopting the method.

"We are in the very first stage of the project," said Bohumír Sobota, deputy director of the Konečná Street elementary school in Karlovy Vary. "We are waiting for funding from City Hall, which we will receive in December."

Sobota said he is convinced that the new requirement will improve attendance at his school, but he is getting resistance from members of his own staff.

"While 50 percent of school employees welcome the idea, the other 50 percent are keeping their distance," he said. "We are going to test the system for six months, during which time teachers will get to know it better — even if we might have to push some of them a little bit."

Parents were not notified about the impending system, Sobota said.

Several more schools will follow suit, said CCA Group, the IT firm behind the attendance system, with nationwide availability beginning next school year.

Licenses for the system, called Presence, will run between 6,000 Kč ($275) and 9,000 Kč per year, with hardware installation costing up to 35,000 Kč.

"Nothing can replace personal communication between teachers and parents," said František Halada, head of CCA's Škola Online project. The "open, frequent and clear information" his company provides is only a supplement.

Schools using Škola Online software — some 200 nationwide — already communicate with parents through the Internet, transmitting test scores or punishments directly, eliminating students as go-betweens. Text messages of these notices are available and personalized to the school and parent: Parents can be notified of any grade below a B, for example.

All of the data available online is encrypted, with CCA's security measures certified by the state.

Little brothers

The notion for Presence came when CCA began to sell student chip cards to schools for opening doors or use in dining rooms. Several school administrators proposed integrating an attendance component into the cards. CCA ran with the idea, also introducing the option of fingerprinting.

Schools will be able to customize the system to their individual needs, said Halada.

"Some will have the system by the main entrance and some outside classrooms," he said. "Having Presence outside or even inside the classroom has a distinct advantage. It offers certainty that the students did go to their classrooms. The strong point of this system will be the elimination of truancy and criminal activity for some juveniles."

While International School of Prague Director Robert Landau can see the value for a school with truancy problems, he has reservations.

"It's kind of like technology is replacing values," he said, adding that he could imagine schools using Presence to solve what is actually a deeper problem in the school.

He hopes his own school never has to use a similar technology.

Halada said his company doesn't expect quick acceptance of the system.

"Schools don't necessarily need it," he said. "And it is not prescribed for adoption by anyone."

But he expects parental interest to drive its eventual adoption in schools, and hopes for more widespread use in two to three years.

Not all parents may welcome the technology, though.

Systems similar to Presence were the main surprise in this year's nominations for Prague's Big Brother Awards, said Filip Pospíšil of Iuridicum Remedium, the civic rights group that gives out the awards.

"There is a real reason to be concerned," he said. "They educate students that their privacy is not important, that their privacy is something that can be taken from them."

Most school administrators are adopting a more cautious approach to the technology than Sobota.

"Our school may be interested in having one as well, but will leave any decision for next year," said Miroslav Peer, director of Na Růžovém vrchu elementary school, also in Karlovy Vary. "I feel the Presence system could be beneficial, but, as to how much, we really have to wait and see how it works in reality."