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✅ How do your teachers prefer to grade assignments?

Ben Leddy

Hi all! Ben here from the LMS team. We’re exploring some updates around inputting grades, and would love to know which of these approaches best matches you or your teachers’ grading style:

When I add assignment grades in Blackbaud, I would want them to be visible to students and families…

Immediately: as soon as I type in a grade, that grade is automatically committed to the gradebook and is visible to students and families.
At a time of my choosing: my entries are saved, but remain drafts until I choose to commit them, in bulk or individually, to the gradebook.

We’d love to hear from you in the thread below. If you’re game, we’d also love to connect for a call — feel free to message me or reach out ben.leddy@blackbaud.me.

Thanks, and happy grading!

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Comments

Sandra Ross

Our school prefers to decide when the grades are available for viewing by role. Students immediately once they are entered; Parents we hide grades until we are 3 weeks into the semester.

Ben Leddy

Thanks, Sandra!

Scott Chrysler

Ben -

A quick survey of our faculty has them firmly in the "2. At a time of my choosing: my entries are saved, but remain drafts until I choose to commit them, in bulk or individually, to the gradebook" camp.

I'd also welcome a call if you would like.

Scott

Ben Leddy

Thanks Scott Chrysler‍! Feel free to send me a message and we can get something on the books: ben.leddy@blackbaud.me

Geoffrey Goodfellow

Definitely a 2 for our teachers as well. As one teacher put it, choice 2 is also more broad and includes choice 1. Choice 2 gives the teacher options, and if they want the grades to show immediately, they could commit immediataely after grade entry while other teacher might prefer to commit at a later date.

Ben Leddy

Thanks, Geoffrey Goodfellow‍ !

Brian Gray

Our teachers are (of course) split in their opinions - some prefer that recorded grades are visible immediately and others prefer that they are visible only when the teacher chooses. This can vary per assignment (or assignment type) for any given teacher.

The other twist in our policy is: we publish a letter grade only for each assignment to students, regardless of how the teacher recorded the grade in the gradebook. If the teacher recorded a 90, 91, or 92, the student should see our equivalent of A-.

To implement this policy now, teachers enter their scores, but must also add a comment to the assignment for each student to show the letter grade. We would like to see an option (set at the division level) to publish the letter grade equivalent for an assignment grade.

Ben Leddy

Thanks, Brian Gray‍ . Regarding the grading policy, is there a desire to mask the numeric grade entirely? Or to have to two displayed together?

Susan Ott

Much to my surprise, our teachers overwhelmingly voted for #1.However, several did say it depends on the type of assignment. If #2 includes #1, it seems like a no brainer though.

Ben Leddy

Thanks Susan Ott‍ !

Brian Gray

We would need for the numeric grade to be masked from view for the student. Students should see the letter grade equivalent of the numeric grade and comments only.

BTW - our policy is to not publish assignments or assignment grades to parents. We encourage the parents to sit with the student to look at assignments together.

bkg

Ben Leddy

Thanks, Brian Gray‍ . I'd encourage you to vote and add a comment on the idea titled "Display only letter grades (not percentages) in students' open gradebook" so we can keep track of this. Thanks!

Sheila Long

I surveyed my teachers and the majority voted for #1 "Immediately". Although about 20% did vote for #2 "At a time of my choosing."

Ben Leddy

Thanks Sheila Long‍ !