Setting Up the Gradebook

Within your courses, grades are displayed in the Gradebook and on the Submissions page for your assessments using a grading schema. A schema takes the points scored on an item and compares them to the item's total points possible to derive a percentage. This percentage is then mapped to a score range and displayed as a grade, such as a letter (A, B, C) or Pass/Fail. The available default grading schemas are points, percentage, letters, or complete/incomplete. All default and custom grading schemas in your course appear in the Grade using menu for new and existing graded items. 

NOTE: You can have up to 100 grading schemas in your course.  See Multiple grading schemas.

Opening the Grading Schema

1.    You can make changes to the default grading schema in the Gradebook.
2.    Select the Settings icon to access the Gradebook Settings Panel.
3.    Select the Manage Grade Schema to see the schema(s) for the course (i.e. Letter).

NOTE: If you make changes to the Grading Schema, the changes only apply to the course that you are currently working in.

Renaming the Grading Schema

1.    To rename the grading schema in your course, point to the title to access the edit icon.

• The name change will appear in the Grade using menu for a gradable item
• Note: Schema titles have a 64-character limit

 Editing the Grading Schema

1.    Select a value to edit
2.    Start from the bottom and edit the values for the last grade value. Once completed, move on to the next row.
3.    To delete a row, point to the row and the delete icon will appear.

• NOTE: At least two rows must remain for the schema to be valid, and you cannot delete the last row.

4.    To insert a row, select the plus sign (+) that appears below each row.
5.    Select Save when finished

• NOTE: You will be unable to leave the panel until you select Save or Cancel.

6.    Select the X to return to the Gradebook Settings panel

You can receive alerts in your activity stream about student performance and activity. You can set an alert for the number of missed due dates and the number of days since their last access. If you’ve set up the overall grade for your course, you can also receive an alert when a student’s overall grade drops below a certain percentage.

  
Select View Course Activity to go to the Course Activity report.

This report won't display if there's not enough data in your course to populate it. 
 

You can choose to automatically assign zeros to missing work past the due date. If allowed, students and groups can still submit work after an automatic zero is assigned to improve their score. Then, you can grade as normal.

If you assign automatic zeros, your settings are applied to these gradable items:
•    Assignments and group assignments
•    Tests and group tests
•    Gradable individual and group discussions
•    Discussions
•    Journals
•    SCORM
•    Manual grade items
•    LTI items

The automatic zeros setting doesn't apply when you collect submissions offline. If you collect submissions offline, you must manually create the student attempts and submission dates and times.

Impact of Zeros in the Gradebook

The Overall Grade operation effectively calculates a running total. This means that grade columns that haven’t been attempted yet are ignored when calculating the total or overall grade for the course. As a result, an instructor should consider turning off the “Automatic Zeroes” operation to ensure that zeroes are not added to a grading cell if they want to exempt a student from a particular assignment.

A. Open the Gradebook.
B. Click on the Settings icon.
 

C. Uncheck the “Automatic Zeroes” option.
 

 D. In the pop-up window choose the appropriate option that you want, and then select “Confirm.”
 

If you don't have the overall grade configured yet, you'll see a banner prompting you to set it up. 

 
Don't want to use the overall grade? Select Hide this message to remove this prompt from your screen. If you change your mind, you can always add the overall grade via the Gradebook Settings.

Setting Up the Overall Grade

1.    From the banner, select Set it up. The Overall Grade page appears.
2.    Under Select a Calculation Type, select one of these options: 

• Points. A points-based grade calculation may aid transparency as it makes clear to students what’s worth more in a course and what’s worth less. You can select which categories and items you want to include in the calculation. The max total points available in the course will be decided by the items and categories you include in the calculation.
• Weighted. The weighted calculation calculates categories and grade items as a percentage of a final grade worth 100%. You can assign percentage values to any course item and category and choose whether to weight items in the same category proportionally or equally. For more information see Create weighted calculations.
• Advanced. Use a custom formula to calculate the overall grade.

Add a points overall grades calculation

1.    From the Overall Grade page, under Select a Calculation Type, select Points. 
2.    Categories containing items are listed first and ordered by the number of items contained. Expand a category to see its items. From here you can:

• Unlink an item from its category. This is useful if you want to include the item in the calculation separately from the rest of the category. 
• Exclude an item within a category from the overall grade calculation. This removes the item points from the total number of points available in the course. The item or category turns purple to indicate that it's not included in the calculation. Select the button again to include the item or category in the calculation. 

3.    For each category, you can select Edit calculation rules to verify or update the current settings:

• Drop Scores removes the specified number of the highest or lowest grades for each category from the calculation. 
• Use only removes all grades from the calculation except for the highest or lowest score.

4.    Under Overall Grade Settings, choose how to display the overall grade — as a letter grade, percentage, points or any grading schema created in the course. When you select Points, instructors and students see the overall grade as a fraction of the total points earned, divided by the total points available in the course. For example, 745/800.
5.    When you select Show to Students, students can view the overall grade and calculation details from the information button in their Gradebook. 
6.    Select Save.

Add a weighted overall grades calculation

1.    From the Overall Grade page, under Select a Calculation Type, select Weighted. 
2.    Under Weigh gradable items within a category, select Proportionally or Equally.

• Proportionally takes the raw scores of the included columns and categories and then divides the result by the total points possible to obtain a percentage for each item in the weighted column. The resulting percentages retain the proportional weight of each item so that items with a larger point value have more effect on the calculated grade.
• When the columns and categories you select for the weighted column have different point values, Equally converts them to percentages. These percentages are averaged to obtain an equal value for each of the items included in the weighted column. 

3.    Categories containing items are listed first and ordered by the number of items contained. Expand a category to see its items. From here you can:

• Unlink an item from its category. This is useful if you want to include the item in the calculation separately from the rest of the category. 
• Unlock an item or category to edit its weighting. The calculation will automatically balance all unlocked items to ensure the overall calculation equals 100%. 
• Exclude an item within a category from the overall grade calculation. This removes the item points from the total number of points available in the course. The item or category turns purple to indicate that it's not included in the calculation. Select the button again to include the item or category in the calculation. 

4.    For each category, you can select Edit calculation rules to verify or update the current settings:

• Drop Scores removes the specified number of the highest or lowest grades for each category from the calculation. 
• Use only removes all grades from the calculation except for the highest or lowest score.

5.    Under Overall Grade Settings, choose how to display the overall grade — as a letter grade, percentage, points, Complete/Incomplete, or any grading schema created in the course. When you select Points, instructors and students see the overall grade as a fraction of the total points earned, divided by the total points available in the course. For example, 745/800.
6.    When you select Show to Students, students can view the overall grade and calculation details from the information button in their Gradebook. 
7.    Select Save.

Add an advanced overall grade calculation

This option gives you greater flexibility and supports varied evaluation practices.  It is useful if you want to base the overall grade on a calculation involving one or more specific assessments.
1.    From the Overall Grade page, under Select a Calculation Type, select Advanced. 
2.    Start creating your formula. In the left pane, select a function, variable, or operator to add it to the right pane.

For example, select Total in the left pane to add that function to the right pane. Expand the list and select the items to include in the formula. When you choose a category, all items in that category are included. You must choose graded items and other calculations individually. Scroll through the list to view all items. In the Variable menu, select an item to include.

• Select an item and then click outside of the menu to exit and save the selection in the right pane. Each element you add to the formula appears at the end. 
• To reorder your formula, select an element and drag it to the new location.
• To remove an element, select it and click the X. 
• To completely start over, select Clear to remove all elements at one time.
• NOTE: You can reuse any function, variable, or operator.

3.    Under Overall Grade Settings:

• To divide the points earned by the total graded points, select Calculate grades based on points earned out of total graded points. If you don't select this option, the overall grade is calculated as earned points divided by the total possible points. 
• Under Select how the overall grade is displayed, select letter grade, percentage, points, Complete/Incomplete, or any grading schema created in the course. When you select Points, instructors and students see the overall grade as a fraction of the total points earned, divided by the total points available in the course. For example, 745/800.
• To allow students to view the overall grade and calculation details from the information button in their Gradebook, select Show to Students. 

4.    Select Validate to check the accuracy of your formula. Issues with your formula are highlighted in red. Make changes as needed. 
5.    Once the formula is confirmed as valid, select Save. 
 
You can introduce values with up to two decimal places.
Anonymously graded assessments aren't included in the calculations until you turn off anonymity.

Edit overall grade settings

To edit the configuration for the overall grade column, from the Gradebook, select Settings to open the Gradebook Settings panel. Then select Manage overall grade settings.
 

Use the Students Visibility setting to hide or show unenrolled students. 

With this option turned on, students are hidden from these gradebook areas: 
•    Grades page 
•    Students page 
•    Calculation student list 
•    Gradable items student list 
•    Submission tab for an assessment 
•    Student Activity tab for an assessment 
 

When you create a gradable item, it automatically appears in the gradebook and is associated with the appropriate category. 
•    You can use categories when you create calculated items, such as an assignments average.
•    You can create new categories to customize how coursework is grouped in your course. 
•    You can use custom categories when you set up the overall grade.

To create a new gradebook category, select the Settings icon in the gradebook. In the Gradebook Settings panel, select Add New Category and type a name.

 
Each time you create a graded item in your course, you have the option to change the grade category, so the item is grouped into one of the custom gradebook categories. On the Gradebook Settings panel, select the custom category in the Grade Categories menu.
 

You can create multiple rubrics in your course. Rubrics consist of rows and columns. There are no limits to the number of rows and columns you can add to your rubrics. The rows correspond to the assessed criteria. The columns correspond to the level of achievement that describes each criterion. You can create four types of rubrics: percentage, percentage range, points, and points range. New rubrics have four rows and four columns. You can delete all but one row and one column. You can associate rubrics with assignments, discussions, and journals.

 
You can only associate rubrics with assignments. You can't create rubrics at small screen widths, such as mobile devices. Rubrics are read-only on mobile devices.

Reuse Rubrics

You can reuse rubrics to save time by copying them into a course. Select the Rubrics folder from the Copy Content menu in your course and click the checkbox to copy all of the course’s rubrics.

 
You can expand the rubrics folder and check the boxes for any individual rubrics that you would like to copy.

 
 
Copied Rubrics appear in the Gradebook Settings area. Select Gradebook, select the gear icon in the top right-hand corner, and review all the rubrics in the Course Rubrics section. 
To learn more, see: 

• Rubric types
  • Percentage-based
  • Percentage-range
  • Points-based
  • Points-range
• Create rubrics
  • Generate rubrics with the AI Design Assistant
• Associate rubrics to assessments
  • Remove associations
• Student view of rubrics
• Manage rubrics
  • Copy rubrics
  • Delete rubrics
  • Copy rubrics between courses

You can create and manage grade notations to override a student's overall grade if their performance falls outside the defined schema. For example, if a student has to withdraw from your course in the middle of a semester, you can use a grade notation to indicate the student's circumstance or situation without assigning an actual grade.

1. To add a grade notation, select Add Overall Grade Notation. Enter a name and description. 
2. To apply a grade notation, go to the gradebook in Grades view and select the student's overall grade cell. From the menu, choose the notation. The cell will turn gray to indicate that you overrode the overall grade.
3. To remove the override, select the student's overall grade cell and select Undo Override. The overall grade reverts back to the overall grade calculation you defined for the course.
    

Manually graded columns can be created for assignments that don't require a submission in Blackboard such as class participation, extra credit, and in-class graded assignments or presentations. 

You can't add files, rubrics, goals, or groups to manually created items/columns. If you want to add these options to assessments without submissions, see: Collect submissions offline.
To create a manually graded column:
1. In your course gradebook, open the Gradable Items page.
2. Select the plus sign wherever you want to add an item/column and select Add Item.

 
3. In the panel, type a title like Class Participation or Extra Credit #1 if you intend to have more than one of the same manually graded items throughout the course.

• NOTE: The title has a limit of 255 characters. If you don't add a title, "New Item" and the date appear in the list.

4. Optionally, make the item visible to students.

 
5. Provide the details, such as a description and a graded unit. You can choose points, percentages, or letters. If you choose points, specify the maximum number of points possible.

• NOTE: If you are using this column for extra credit, set the points possible to 0.

6. Optionally, add the new item to a category to use when you create weighted grade calculations.
7. Click Save. Now you can click on the newly created column and begin entering students' grades by clicking in each student’s grading cell on the Grades page. You can also add feedback for each student.
 

Use the Add Calculation option for calculating a score based on a custom formula for a selection of coursework, such as only certain assessments or categories.
As an example, create a total column to calculate the total points earned across just a single grade category.
1. In the gradebook, look under Gradable Items.
2. Select the plus sign where you want to add the total points column and select Add Calculation.

 
3. At the top, name the new item “Total Category Points” and optionally, type a description. The Grade Schema should read Points.
4. From the functions list, choose “Total.”  Now hover over the newly added Total tab and click the drop-down arrow. There are check boxes for every category and each individual assignment.

 
5. Select a category (adding each individual assignment, test, and manually graded item in a category), otherwise select each individual assignment from the category that you want to be included in the calculated column.
•    Note: Selecting both a category and an individual item that is included in that category will result in a duplicate grade.
6. Click Save.
 

You can manually create and add a unique Total Calculation column to the Gradebook using either a weighted or points-based calculation method. The options for setting up the column are identical to those found in the Overall Grade settings.

 
1. From the Gradebook, in the Gradable Items or Grades view, select the plus sign where you want to place the new column and select Add Total Calculation.
2. Enter a title for the calculation. If you don't add a title, "New Total Calculation" plus the date appear in the gradebook. 
3. Under Settings, enter a description and select the grade schema — Points, Percentage, Letter, or Complete/Incomplete.
4. To display the calculation column on student Grades pages, select Visible to students. Students will see the calculated grades, but not the descriptions or formulas.