Once students get to university attendance is no longer mandatory as it was in their secondary classrooms. This leads to students being able to make their own decisions regarding attendance and it is important, as instructors, to understand the reasoning behind their decisions to attend or not attend their classes. In an informal survey of 33 international students, during the pandemic, I asked students to articulate some of the reasons why they attend class and also some reasons that keep them away from attending class. I have found, over the past year, that some students are always in class and other students pretend to be in class by logging on but then disappear so when called upon they are not there to answer questions. The answers varied among students, as expected, but there were some similarities attached to their reasons for attendance and nonattendance. The most common reasons for attending had to do with the students desire to learn and be up to date with the information presented in class. They stressed that attending class allowed them to ask questions of their instructors in real time. The reasons for non-attendance revolved around illness, work commitments, other assignments due, lack of interest in the topic, and the fact that some of their lecturers did not engage the students in discussions making the class boring.