School Preferences - Grade Category

DJM Updated by DJM

School Preferences - Grades Category

Audience: Middle and High School Administrators and Grading Managers

These preferences are covered in the Grading Manager Workshops

Schools have many preferences that they control and that they may change as needed. This topic covers only the Grade category

To view or update preferences

From the School view (sis.mybps.org)

  1. Navigate to the School top tab
  2. Click on the Setup/Details side tab
  3. Click on the Preferences sub-tab
  1. Select the Grades category from the dropdown list (far right)
  1. You will see the School Grade Preferences

Gradebook

Add/drop ignore window (days)

Type the number of days you want the system to refrain from displaying drop/adds in the Gradebook at the beginning of a school year.

Add/drop align Gradebook scores behavior

Select one of the following to determine what happens to a student’s assignment scores when the student transfers from one course section to another:

  • Department: The assignment scores are copied to the student’s new course if the course’s previous and new department match.
  • Course number: The assignment scores are copied if the previous and new course numbers match.
  • Do not copy: The assignment scores are not copied.

If you select Department or "Course number", the following must be true:

  • The assignment categories are the same in both sections.
  • The total points for both assignments are the same.

Allow multiple posts by staff

Select this checkbox if you want teachers to be able to post their grades several times during the grade post window. This lets teachers enter their grades, post their grades, go back into their Gradebook to make any necessary edits, and post again. After the end of the post period, teachers can no longer post grades.

Allow editing of term weights by staff

Select this checkbox to allow teachers to customize the grade weights used in the district grade calculation for transcript average columns. This preference is deselected by default.

For more information, see Enable Teachers to Customize Grade Weights in District Average Calculations.

Note: This field appears in the District (Root Organization), Intermediate Organization and school preferences.

Current classes day offset

Type the number of days you want staff members to be able to view classes from the previous term in their Gradebooks when they use the Current Classes filter in the Staff view, Gradebook or Attendance > Class.

Active date enabled by

This field is for schools that offer continuing courses. These courses do not start or end during the established grade terms. They might continue from one term to the next (or one year to the next) before the teacher posts a final grade. This field determines how the active date – the start of the course for each student in the section – is set.

-By first assignment mark only is the default. Aspen sets the student's active date when the teacher enters the first score for an assignment.

-Select By multiple assignments for the teacher to indicate the active date using the Active Assignment field on an assignment's details page. Notes:

- If the teacher does not select the Active Assignment checkbox for any assignment, Aspen sets the active date once any score is entered. - If the teacher enables the Active Assignment field for one assignment, the active date is set when the teacher enters a score for that assignment. - If the teacher enables the Active Assignment field for more than one assignment, the active date is set when a score is entered for all of the flagged assignments.

-Select Disabled for teachers to manually enter the active date. The Active Date column appears on the Gradebook Scores page and on student transcripts if associated with the transcript definition.

Grade Scales

Default grade scale

Click the picklist icon to see the Grade Scale pick list. Users in the Staff view will only be able to see and select the grade scale selected here.

Example: You select the high school grade scale here. In the Staff view, high school teachers can only select this grade scale in their Gradebook user preferences, when they click Options > Lookup on their Scores page, and when they create an assignment or an assignment category.

Calculations

Decimals

Type the number of decimal places you want the system to calculate.

Credit update procedures

Click the picklist icon to select the credit update procedure your district uses, if it is different than the Aspen standard credit update procedure.

Hide assignment score percentage bar

When enabled, this preference hides the percentage bar from the Score column on the assignments page in the Family and Student portals (Academics > Assignments). Schools that use standards-based grading might want to select this checkbox to prevent the bar from appearing.

Averages to Show in Gradebook

Category average display mode

Display category average by term is the default. When set to the default, a teacher's Gradebook displays an average for each category (such as homework or tests) by term. Select Display category cumulative average for the Gradebook to display the average for each category since the beginning of the class, instead of by term.

Term average

This field is enabled by default, so that the term average column appears on the Gradebook Scores page when Grade Columns are set to Averages or All. Schools that use standards-based grading can deselect this checkbox to hide the term average column in the Gradebook.

Semester cumulative average

Select this checkbox to display the semester running average for students in the Staff view. Semester running averages calculate based on the assignment grades within each of the terms inside of it, not on the average for each term.

Note: Only school years with an even number of grading terms can use semester running averages.

If you select this checkbox, and a teacher selects the "Show semester averages" checkbox in their user preferences, the column appears on the Scores page in the Gradebook. Otherwise, the teacher cannot view semester running averages.

Note: Aspen uses the column header Semester # for semester running averages. For example, Semester 1 is the column header for running average for S1.

Overall cumulative average

Select this checkbox to display an overall cumulative average for students in the Staff view. The overall cumulative average includes all grades and scores entered since the beginning of the class, regardless of term. Aspen calculates the overall cumulative average using the average mode specified in the teacher's Gradebook.

The Cumulative column can appear on the Scores page in the Gradebook if this preference is selected, and the teacher sets their user preferences on the Gradebook tab to show the overall cumulative average. Otherwise, the teacher cannot view overall cumulative averages.

Note: Aspen uses the column header Cumulative for the overall cumulative average.

Report Cards

This category does not apply to BPS

Report card message

Type a message to appear on report cards.

Honor roll qualification list

Select the qualification list you want the system to use to generate the honor roll when you run report cards.

Transcript Auto-calculation Options

Applies to Credit Mode, GPA Mode, Rank Mode and, Grade Mode

Credit mode

GPA mode

Rank mode

Grade mode

Define how Aspen will auto-calculate a student's credits, GPA, rank and/or grades when you manually change a grade on his or her transcript.

Note: If you manually change the value in the Credit field for a transcript record, the Adjusted icon appears next to the value. When this icon appears, the system does not auto-calculate the credits. To allow auto-calculation of an adjusted value, delete any value in the Credit field and save the record.

You can select a different mode for how the system updates each field. Select one of the following modes for each:

  • Disable: to have the system not auto-calculate a student's credits, GPA, grades or rank when you manually change a grade on his or her transcript. The Update checkbox does not appear on the student's transcript page.
  • Force: to force the system to auto-calculate a student's credits, GPA, grades or rank when you manually change a grade on his or her transcript. The Update checkbox appears on the student's transcript page, but the user cannot deselect it.
  • Enable - Checked: to enable auto-calculation of a student's credits, GPA, grades or rank when you manually change a grade on his or her transcript, and to have the Update checkboxes automatically selected on the student's transcript page:

Users can decide to deselect any of the checkboxes before making a grade change.

  • Enable - Unchecked: to enable auto-calculation of a student's credits, GPA, grades or rank when you manually change a grade on his or her transcript, and to have the Update checkboxes deselected on the student's transcript page:

Note: If you select Enable - Checked or Enable - Unchecked, you must also select the Update earned credits on change checkbox for each transcript definition column you want users to be able to update credits for upon changing a transcript grade.

Users can decide to select any of the checkboxes before making a grade change.

Note: If you force both student GPA and rank to be auto-calculated whenever a student’s transcript grade is updated, the system recalculates the student’s GPA and updates the rank of all students in his or her year of graduation. This can cause moderate wait times for users, depending on how many students are in that year of graduation. If your school or schools have large graduating classes, you can avoid this issue by selecting Enable - Unchecked for the GPA mode and Rank mode preferences. Users can then select just the Update GPA checkbox when altering a student’s transcript grade, allowing them to update student ranks at a later time. This can be useful when users have to update transcript grades for multiple students in the same year of graduation.

Note: Aspen cannot recalculate a student’s rank if his or her GPA is not also recalculated. Depending on your selection for the GPA mode preference, certain options are disallowed in the Rank mode preference, as follows: If you select Disable for the GPA mode preference, the following options are disallowed for Rank mode: --Enable-Checked --Enable-Unchecked --Force If you select Enable - Unchecked for GPA mode, the following options are disallowed for Rank mode: --Enable-Checked --Force An error message appears if you select any of the above disallowed options.

Rank Options

Rank type

Select if your school calculates rank using Total Points or Grade Point Average.

Rank Calculation mode

Select if your school calculates rank using Cumulative points or Current year points only.

Be sure to Save if changes are made

See also Follett's Help on Grade Preferences

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