Some students often manage to get through their college years by attending very few of their classes while not even having their grade suffer. In my opinion, however, students should be required to attend their classes for several important reasons. Many professors have discussions in their classes, but a student who is not there cannot participate in them. Class discussions can introduce students to many different opinions and points of view. Even in middle school, we sometimes have class discussions during which we can learn a lot from what the other students say. I am sure that at college, where the students have more firsthand knowledge at their disposal, the class discussions are even better and more enlightening.Students who fail to attend these discussions should also fail there classes. Also, students who do not attend classes may lack basic knowledge of their majors since they are deprived of the majority of the information that is taught in the class. This will be doing them a disservice later in their lives. For example, my uncle usually skipped his college classes, but he still managed to get good grades. Later, when he got hired based primarily on those good grades; his new employer found out that he really did not have that much knowledge. He was fired from that job and had to find another, which was not as good. Despite his good grades, my uncle still lacked basic knowledge of his major. Students should be required to attend their classes in order to help them learn better by participating in class discussions, and to provide them with the knowledge they need for the future. While there may be other fun things to do, going to class is a wise investment for the future.