The goal: create a weekly report mechanism using assignments and a rubric from a division-specific rubric in the rubric bank

The process: As an admin, create the template rubric and add to rubric bank. As a teacher, add the rubric from the rubric bank to 'My rubrics'. Create assignment, associate the rubric with it, configure multiple instances of the assignment to be due at the end of every week, and set it to be unpublished, as this is meant to be internal. Record grades using rubric.

The problem: When recording points for a rubric the first time, a red warning message informs the teacher that they will not be able to make edits to the instance of the rubric once they've started evaluating it. This prevents the teacher from changing the rubric associated with the assignment or removing a rubric association entirely. However, for each subsequent instance of the assignment that has not yet been recorded, this rubric lock down warning message appears again.

Evaluating the problem: There appears to be more layers to rubrics compared to other aspects in the system. When you create a block in the system, for example, this block can be deleted until it is assigned to a schedule set. Once associated with the schedule set, the block can't be changed or removed.

I feel this should also be the case for this rubric. As a teacher, when I copy a rubric from the rubric bank I understanding I am making my own instance of the rubric that is uniquely mine. If I make any changes, those are my own. However, once I have settled on these settings I would expect once assigned to an assignment and grades recorded that I would then be unable to make changes to this copy of the rubric. However, this is not the case. Once graded, I am still able to make changes to my rubric. This means that when copying a rubric from the rubric bank that I'm not only making an instance of that rubric that is uniquely mine but that every assignment I create and associate my version of the rubric to that a separate instance is also created at the assignment level.

This is problematic for a number of reasons:

1. By allowing teachers to edit the rubric after assigning it to an assignment and recording grades, it prevents teachers from ensuring the configured criteria across assignments is the same. For example, I could assign X rubric with certain settings and later in the year assign that same rubric with different settings. This makes it very difficult to ensure consistency across assignments and would require individually reviewing each assignment to see the configured rubric settings for that instance.

2. The language in the warning message when recording rubric grades for an assignment makes it seem like it is the rubric which is being locked down when in fact it is the assignment which cannot have its associated rubric changed.

3. Having this red warning lock down rubric message for every assignment comes across as aggressive and that teachers are doing something wrong when in fact this is meant to be informational. When teachers are already hesitant and unsure about certain aspects of how the system handles grading, this message doesn't come across in a way that encourages teachers to use this tool.

   1. For example red warnings appear in situations like in Grading when a required grade or comment is blank / unrecorded. When a teacher checks the 'Ready for Review' checkbox, a red warning appears to inform them that they missed something.

Proposed Solutions:

1. Make rubrics behave like other aspects of the system in that when associated with some other piece do not let it be changed. If things need to be changed, then the rubric should be duplicated, given a different name, and then alter its configuration as desired. This would guarantee that any assignment with associated rubric X has the settings listed in rubric X under 'My rubrics'.

2. Change the language in the Lock Down Rubric message to be more accurate. Assuming the behavior is changed as described in the previous point, the only difference then before confirming and after confirming this warning message is that the teacher cannot change or remove an associated rubric with the assignment. Even if the behavior of rubrics is ultimately left as is and not locked down once assigned to an assignment and grades recorded, this message should be changed to more accurately reflect what's actually happened. Desired message & differences highlighted below:

   1. Header: Lock Down Assignment Rubric; Body: You will no longer be able to change the rubric associated with this assignment once you begin evaluating it. Are you sure you want to use <Rubric Name> with this assignment and being evaluating?

3. Change the lock down message from being a red warning to be a blue information message. The red warning comes across as doing something wrong or missing something, but in reality this is just an informational message. As such, making this blue would be more in line with these types of messages elsewhere in the system (see attached example) and also avoid the emotional response from teachers when they think they are doing something wrong or that something with system is problematic or not working as expected.

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