Communicate to parents and students when factors are used on assignments

Parents cannot see when a factor is used on assignments.  This makes the grade calculation look wrong.  Please add the factor to reports and the popup window on the progress tab.

  • Suzette Crowhurst
  • Jan 4 2016
  • Planned
  • Attach files
  • Nicole Scott commented
    January 06, 2023 15:44

    Can someone provide an update on when this will be implemented? We have had quite a few issues and questions this semester because parents cannot see the assignment factor when checking the grade details and the grade values do not communicate the true numbers that are being used in the calculation.

  • Scott Daniel commented
    August 19, 2022 18:53

    Any update on this? I see it is planned but no motion for the last year and 1/2?


    Thanks!

  • Angela Addison commented
    March 17, 2021 22:51

    hi all! So happy to have been able to get some of the longstanding gradebook asks into the plans before I moved on, can't wait to see these get marked closed and see it in users' hands. @Ben Leddy is the PM on LMS now, I've moved onto Core and still have Communications/Website so looking forward to making a difference in those areas (aka feel free to start hitting me up there) but will definitely be tuned in to updates and looking forward to seeing Ben's roadmap updates as much as you are!

  • Jen Brakeman commented
    March 17, 2021 21:32

    I am very happy this feature is being added. Angela Addison, you mentioned de-mystifying the gradebook in a variety of ways, which is great!

    One simple thing you can also do is make sure that the "category", "max grade" and "factor" are simply listed in the student's Assignment Detail for every assignment. I've been working under the assumption that my students can see all of those details, which help them self-regulate and prioritize their work. PLEASE copy over this information into the grade details .

    Thank you!

  • Palmer Seeley commented
    November 19, 2020 14:00

    Thank you for announcing that this feature is coming. This is actually a big deal for teachers--it consumes a lot of time unnecessarily. So, again, thank you.

    To answer David's question below:

    Currently I do double entry on every single assignment that I weight with a factor other than 1--not only do I enter the point value of the assignment and factor in the appropriate fields in the assignment creation pop-up, but I also type the same information into the assignment's description in the same pop-up like this:

    10 points in X Category || Factor 2.5

    But most colleagues do not. Some use factors other than 1 and just confuse the students and parents and advisors and administrators, but most just opt not to use factors because of the lack of transparency provided by Blackbaud to constituencies about factors, so instead they rely on elaborate charts for converting a letter grade into a fraction grade with an odd denominator and thus an odd numerator. For example a 10 point assignment with a factor 2.5 becomes a 25 point assignment. and a C+ on that is...um...let me look it up. Imagine having to do that for every one of 70-some-odd students on every single assignment you enter in the gradebook! In case you'd like to opt for this latter method, I've attached a version of such a chart which does the conversion based on my school's definition of each letter grade's percentage worth.

  • Angela Addison commented
    November 18, 2020 21:36

    we will be showing the calculations in the student gradebook view which will show all of the assignments by assignment type, what their grade was, what the weight was for each and how that added up to the total in our new student gradebook which will be coming out next year.

  • Cristina Pelleya commented
    November 18, 2020 20:24

    It would be great if this was available somewhere in the assignment detail (without having to pull a report) so that students/parents/advisors can see this on the progress tab and/or in the assignment center.

  • Palmer Seeley commented
    August 26, 2019 14:19

    Yes, communicating this information to students and parents seems essential to me. Thank you for the suggestion.

  • David Axelson commented
    April 23, 2018 14:09

    I know this is an old post, but this would be very helpful. At least, students need to be able to see how their assignment grades affect their term grades, which includes factors and weights. I'd be curious to hear how other schools handle this currently.