The Transformation Team

Grades for students are captured and adjusted in the Grade Capture & Course Grade Aggregation Tool.

This can be opened as follows:

• Click the Settings cogwheel on the Moodle course page for the course which holds the assessment wished to capture grades for
• Select ‘Grade Capture and Aggregation’

The Grade Capture and Aggregation Tool will open on the Course Grade Capture tab, where you will see a blank table with headers for student information and Grades.

• Click the magnifying glass beside ‘Student No.’, ‘Surname’, or ‘Forename’ to search for an individual student.
  • Note: Only staff with Manager permissions on Moodle will be able to see students’ surnames and forenames. They will be also be able to hide this information, as described below. All other staff will only see student ID numbers.
• Click any column header to sort the information in the Assessment Grade Capture tool by that column.

• Staff with Manager permissions can access the setting to show or hide student identities, using the settings cog.
  • Note that other members of staff will never be able to see student identities. Student identities can be made visible for external examiners.

• When the Grade Capture Tool is opened, select the Course Grade Category for the course wished to view e.g. Summative. 

• Select the ‘Gradable Activity’ or a Level 2 Grade Category, wished to capture grades for e.g. Essay 1 Summative

• If a Level 2 Grade Category is selected in the second drop-down (as opposed to a single gradable activity), select the gradable activity from the third drop-down menu that will appear
  • Note: See Moode Enhancement Guide for further information on Level 1 and Level 2 Grade Categories

The Grade Capture and Aggregation Tool will open on the Course Grade Capture tab, where you will see a blank table with headers for student information and Grades.

• Click the magnifying glass beside ‘Student No.’, ‘Surname’, or ‘Forename’ to search for an individual student.
• Note: Only staff with Manager permissions on Moodle will be able to see students’ surnames and forenames. They will be also be able to hide this information, as described below. All other staff will only see student ID numbers.
• Click any column header to sort the information in the Assessment Grade Capture tool by that column.
• The ‘sort’ function will only sort the data that is currently displayed on the screen. Therefore, if a cohort of 150 students if to be sorted, the sort activity will only apply for the first 50 students displayed and has to be repeated for all following screens. This is a limitation to the current build. If it is required to sort through the entire cohort of 150 students at once, we recommend downloading a csv of the data and sort through the data there.

• Staff with Manager permissions can access the setting to show or hide student identities, using the settings cog.
• Note that other members of staff will never be able to see student identities. Student identities can be made visible for external examiners.

Once students have completed their assessment and the first grade has been entered to Moodle (see the Moodle Enhancement guide for eligible grading processes), the grades can then be imported from Moodle into the Grade Capture Tool. 

 Open the Grade Capture Tool as outlined in section above

• Click ‘Import Grades from Moodle’ on the Grade Capture Tool. This will import all the grades that have been added in Moodle when marking the assignment

• Any additional grades (e.g. 2nd marking, moderation, etc.) can now be added and recorded in the Grade Capture Tool as outlined in the 'Adjusting and adding additional Grades' section.
• We recommend that users do not import grades from Moodle more than once:
  
  • Any further import beyond the initial one will overwrite the ‘Imported Grade’ column on the Grade Capture Tool and update the provisional grade to reflect the latest imported grade
  • This means that any late penalty, good cause claim, or other grade version will no longer be reflected in the provisional grade and must be re-added
  • A warning message will appear to warn the user that they are about to overwrite the original imported grades.
• Once the activity’s grade has been imported, if the Assignment has been set up to use ‘Marking Workflow’, the workflow status in Moodle will be set to ‘In Review’. This will indicate that all further marking actions should take place in the Grade Capture Tool.

NB: Local practice on recording grades varies. In some areas, a first and second marker will agree on a student’s grade before it is recorded in Moodle. In others, a first marker will record a grade, and then a second marker or moderator records their grade. Both practices are in line with the University’s Code of Assessment.

Where a grade is agreed upon before recording it in Moodle, there is no process change required at this point. If it is then necessary to add other grades, e.g. following resits, please follow the guidance in the next section of this guide.

Where the grade to be awarded by the second marker differs from that awarded by the first marker then existing practices to arrive at an agreed grade within each school are to be followed.

Importing grades for Level 2 Grade Categories

After the initial grades for the assessments or components of assessment stored under the Level 2 Grade Category have been captured in core Moodle, a member of staff can navigate to GCAT as outlined above.

• On the Assessment Grade Capture Tab, selects the Level 1 Grade Category in the drop-down menu at the top of the screen
• Select the Level 2 Grade Category from the second drop-down menu

Click “Import all sub-category grades”

• This button is dynamic and is only presented when the user has selected a Grade Category on the second dropdown menu
• Clicking this button will import all the grades from Moodle for all the components in the sub-category
• Note that all component grades must be in a grade type which is accepted by GCAT. If any of the components in the bulk import use a grade type which is not accepted by GCAT, then an error will be displayed and component grades will not be imported

Additional assessment grade versions can be input either against all students (who have sat the assessment) or against a single student. The additional grades in Schedule A or B can be selected from a drop-down menu, and grades in Points can be manually entered. In the case where an assessment graded in Points has been converted to Schedule A or B, any grade adjustments are to be continued to be input in Points. This will be especially relevant for second and third markers, or when entering late penalties.

Any changes to the grade, irrespective of a school’s chosen practice, and all additional grades should be captured as a new version of the original grade, in GCAT, as a means of maintaining a full audit of grades related to each assessment. Thus, once a grade has been entered, that precise grade cannot be removed, but only be adjusted via entering a new grade as outlined in the sub-section below, 'Adjust a grade for an individual student'.

Note: Updating a grade in Moodle does not automatically update that grade in GCAT. We recommend adding any new versions of grades directly in GCAT, to maintain an audit trail. If you update a grade in Moodle and then choose to import grades into GCAT again, the ‘Imported Grade’ column will be over-written, and the provisional grade will be updated to reflect the latest imported grade. Any late penalty, good cause claim or other grade version will no longer be reflected in the provisional grade and must be re-added

If a user tries to import grades more than once, a warning message will appear to warn them that they are about to overwrite the original imported grade and that the provisional grade will not reflect any additional grades which have been input into the tool. The user must click ‘continue’ to proceed with the action.

Adjust grades for all students

To adjust grades for all participants, such as in the case of a second marker:

• Click ‘Adjust grades’
• Select ‘Add multiple grades’ from the dropdown menu

• Select ‘Reason for Grade’ for the new grade

• Select a grade for each student’s assessment
• For assessments marked in Points, grades in whole numbers can be entered for each student in a text field. The grade must be a grade available within the maximum points for the assessment.
• If the grade entered is not accepted, the textbox will be highlighted in red

• Click ‘Save multiple grades’ to save

• The provisional grade in the ‘Provisional Grade’ column will now reflect this latest grade (refer to the 'Provisional Grade Generation' section for more detail on provisional grades)

Upload additional grades for multiple students

A csv can be uploaded to GCAT to add additional grades for multiple students. These grades must be in the same scale as the original grades, i.e. Schedule A, Schedule B, or Points. If the grade type is Points, the maximum grade available is displayed.

• Navigate to the bulk upload feature by selecting ‘Adjust grades’
• Click ‘Upload additional grades’

• Click ‘Download .csv’ for a template or prepare your own .csv file
• For assignments, the csv template must contain 3 columns in the following order: the student number (populated), the participant number (populated) and the grade (blank):

• For workshops, quizzes and forums, the csv must contain 4 columns in the following order: the student number (populated), student first name (populated), student last name (populated) and the grade (blank):

• Input the grades into the grade column and save the csv.
• Click ‘choose a file’ in the bulk upload feature

• Select your csv file and upload it

• Select whether to ignore the first row.
• The first row can be ignored in cases where the first row contains headers in the csv file.

• Click ‘Upload grades’
• The bulk upload feature matches the data in the csv against the student number and presents a view preview of the data

• Select the reason for the additional grade
• Click ‘Import file’

The grades will be saved under a header which will be the selected reason. The provisional grade will be updated to reflect these latest grades.

Adjust a grade for an individual participant

If only one individual's grade needs to be adjusted/added:

• Click ‘Add new grade’ next to a single student’s name
• Staff will be required to select a grade for the student’s assessment according to the Schedule the assessment is graded under.

• Reason for Grade – select the reason for the new grade
  • If selected ‘Reason for Grade’ is ‘Other’, enter the reason for the grade into the notes field
• Grade - select a grade
• Notes – specify the reason for the amendment
• Click ‘Confirm new grade’ to save the new grade for the student

• The new grade will now be displayed in a new column in the Assessment Grade Capture tab.
• The provisional grade in the ‘Provisional Grade’ column will now reflect this latest grade for that student.

Where a student has been given an administrative grade for an assessment or the course overall and the marker wishes to revert back to the original 22-point scale grade: 

• Open the Course Grade Aggregation tab, as outlined in Opening the Grade Aggregation Tool  
• Adjust course weightings, as outlined in Adjusting Assessment Weightings for an Individual Student
  
• Make no other changes 
• Click ‘save’ 
• The grade should revert from “MV” (or other administrative grade) back to what it was previously
• To ensure that the correct grade is displayed once reverted, you can review the grade history by clicking on the ellipsis next to a student's aggregated course grade and selecting ‘View Course Grade History’ from the dropdown menu 

Discrepancies between first grade, second grade, and third grade

If the first and second grades, the second and third grades, or the first and third grades do not match, these will be highlighted to notify the marker of the need to review the discrepancies.

Once an ‘Agreed Grade’ has been added via the steps outlined in Adjust a Grade for an Individual Student, the highlighting will disappear. 

Adding a late submission grade after initial import has been carried out

If a student submits an assessment late (once other students’ grades have already been imported and adjusted in the Grade Capture Tool), this could have negative impacts on the overall use of the Grade Capture Tool.

As previously mentioned, given that the Provisional Grade column is equal to the latest grade updated in the Grade Capture Tool, if a member of staff re-imports grades from Moodle, then the provisional grade will be updated to be equal to that Moodle grade. Any additional grade versions (e.g. late penalties, good cause claim grades etc.) will no longer apply to the Provisional Grade and will need to be added again. Therefore, it is recommended that grades are only imported once from Moodle to avoid duplication of work.

In order to record a student’s assessment grade when they have submitted late (too late to incorporate into the Grade Capture Tool processes), it is recommended that their grade is recorded directly in Moodle / Gradebook and not imported in the Grade Capture Tool.

The grade will still be available for the Grade Aggregation Tool to use as part of the course grade aggregation calculation, however the assessment grade history for this grade will not be available.

Grades for assessments originally graded in Points can be converted into the 22-pt scale (either Schedule A or Schedule B) using the Grade Conversion functionality. The tool cannot be used to convert from Schedule A/B into Points. This tool can be used either for a single assessment, or for an assessment made up of multiple components. For information on how to convert assessments made up of multiple components, please see the section on [LINK]

Setting up a Grade Conversion

• On the Assessment Grade Capture tab, select the assessment wished to convert
• Click ‘Adjust grades’
• Select ‘Add/adjust grade conversion’

• Conversion Type – Select ‘Points’ or ‘Percentage’
  • This will decide which grade boundaries are to be entered into the columns
  • Note that if the grade boundaries are changed after values have already been added, the columns are returned to being blank.
• Select scale – select from the dropdown menu
  • Depending on the scale selected, the grades available for the conversion change accordingly.
• Input data into the selected column.
  • As the user inputs into a column, the system automatically calculates the relevant % or Points grade boundary and displays this on the greyed out, inactive column

As values are being entered ensure that the following validation rules are met:

• Values can be input with up to 2 decimal places (e.g. 80.58)
• Values must be unique and in order (e.g. A1 = 90; A2 = 85; A3 = 82 etc.).
• The fields for A1 and for H must be set. H must be set to 0. Other fields may be left blank if required.

• Optional - save the conversion scale by adding a name for the scale
  • This will store the conversion scale as a template for future use
  • To permanently overwrite a template, edit and save the conversion scale as a new template. The original template will not be deleted.
  • Note: Conversions are saved per user and cannot be shared across a team or course.
• Click ‘Save changes’.
• If the validation rules are not met, then the tool displays an error or highlight the text-box in bold red and the user will not be able to save the changes.

• The original grade and the converted grade are now visible on the Assessment Grade Capture screen.

Note: Grades will not be rounded. If the grade conversion is set as whole numbers, the grade achieved by a student can be 0.5 below the grade boundary. Grades which are 0.51 below the grade boundary will not be rounded up. For example, if the boundary for an A2 is 80, a student who obtains 79.500 will achieve an A2, but a student who obtains 79.499 will receive an A3.

Adjusting converted grades

Once a grade conversion has been set up, it can be edited as follows:

• Navigate to ‘Adjust grades’ and selecting the menu item ‘Add/adjust grade conversion’

• Enter the desired edits to the grade conversion
• As a grade conversion already exists, when the grade conversion screen loads, the data for the existing grade conversion will be presented.

• Click ‘save changes’

• The updated grades are now visible on the Assessment Grade Capture screen.

To view a history of the individual grade changes:

• Click the three dots next to a student's provisional grade
• Select ‘Assessment grade history’

This will display an audit trail of the conversion originally applied, and any grade changes because of the grade conversion scale being modified.

The provisional grade is equal to the latest available grade based on the date it was added. As soon as a grade for an assessment has been imported into the Grade Capture Tool, the provisional grade is viewable by staff within the Grade Capture Tool at any point in the grading process.

Note: If grades are imported from Moodle a second time, those will overwrite the ‘Imported Grade’ column on the Grade Capture Tool and update the provisional grade to reflect the latest imported grade. This means that any late penalty, good cause claim, or other grade version that had previously been added will no longer be reflected in the provisional grade and must be re-added.

To release the grades to the students:

• Click ‘Release provisional grades’

• Click ‘Yes, release provisional grades’

• The marking workflow status is then automatically updated to ‘Released’
• Students are now able to view the grade on their Dashboard, within Gradebook and on the assessment page.
• For administrative grades (e.g. NS/MV), the grade is recorded as ‘Null’ under the grade and the code is reflected in the grade comments / feedback
• Students will be able to view this code in their grade comments / feedback

Please note that GCAT contains an audit trail of all grades awarded for an assessment, however only the confirmed provisional or ratified grade is ever released to students.

Hide a grade from an individual student

A grade can be hidden from an individual student if, for example, that student is under investigation for plagiarism and their result is not ready for release.

• Select the drop-down menu next to the Provisional Grade and select 'Hide Grade'
  • It is important to ensure that this is done before the grades are released to the rest of the students
  • When ‘Release provisional grades’ is selected all grades are sent to Moodle except the hidden grade(s)
  • The student’s grade can continue to be updated in the Grade Capture Tool

• The Assessment Grade overview now indicates that the grade is hidden within the ‘Provisional Grade’ column.

• Once the student’s grade is ready to be released, select the drop-down menu next to Provisional Grade and select ‘Show Grade’.

• Click ‘Release provisional grades’ to make the grade available to the student in Moodle as per the process above.