attendance

I completely realize that there's no rigorous scientific method to this, but I'd thrown it together in an effort to convince someone that Drupal was not a risk and was on the upswing. My argument was that the real strength of a CMS was evidenced by its developer community.

NOTE:
WordCamp SF (May 2010): 770 attendees
DrupalCon SF (Apr 2010): 3000 attendees

Hi,
I have been implementing website/crm solution for a school. And I am stuck at implementing a attendance system for it. This attendance system will also include attendance of teachers. Right now I am creating a form with the name of students and giving select list options (present,absent,others) in front of them.

but this solution is not very elegant and analyzing it really difficult. Can anyone help me in this area.
Thanks
Nikhil