Exploring the Grade Center

Overview

The Grade Center is made up of rows and columns of student information and gradable items. Cells in the grid contain data specific to corresponding students. All cells and column headings contain menus for various actions. The user can access information, or navigate to other pages to interact with the Grade Center.

The appearance of the Grade Center is completely configurable. For more information on the changing the Grade Center, see Creating Smart Views in the Grade Center and Sorting the Grade Center.

The Grade Center page contains the following areas, which display from the top of the page downward and from left to right:

• Action Bar – Row containing a set of tools with their respective options.
• GradeCenter– Columns, rows, and cells that make up the current view of the Grade center data.
• Grade Information Bar – Row of information about a selected Column.
• Icon Legend – Information on the meaning of icons that appear in spreadsheet cells.

Note: New Courses or Restored Course will contain two created columns: a Total Points column and a Weighted Grade column. The user must configure the settings of these two columns. For more information about Calculated Grade columns, see Calculating Grades.

Action Bar

The following icons are displayed in the toolbar of the Grade Center page:

• Add GradeColumn – An icon used to create a Grade Column in the Grade Center. For more information on creating Columns, see Adding Grade Columns to the Grade Center.
• Add Calculated Column– a drop-down menu with options for creating Calculated Columns in the Grade Center. For more information on creating Calculated Columns, see Calculating Grades.
• Manage – Displays the Grade Center management options when the action link is triggered. Selections include options for:

• Uploading data into the Grade Center from an external source file.
• Downloading data from the Grade Center in a delimited file format.
• Categories classifications of Columns of gradable items such as "Test" or "Assignment".
• Smart Views custom made views of Grade Center data created by Instructors and saved for continued use.
• Grading Periods user-defined segments within the Grade Center that can be defined as Terms, Semesters, Quarters, Years, and so on.
• Grading Schemas map scored gradable items into a user-facing display.
• Show/Hide Users determines whether a student's record is visible in the Grade Center.
• Organize Grade Center allows Instructors to change the order and visibility of Columns as well as assign Columns to Grading Periods and Categories.
• Showing and Hiding Users allows Instructors to hide or show users in the Grade Center views.

• Email – Displays the Email options when the action link is triggered. For more information on sending email from the Grade Center, see Sending Email from the Grade Center.
• Reports – Displays a page from which Reports for the Course are created. For more information on Reports, see Creating Reports.
• Grade History – Displays a page where the Grade History of any selected students is displayed. For more information on Grade History, see Grade History.
• Current View – A drop-down menu that lists all the different views of the Grade Center, each of which can be set as the default view. Current View includes the following possibilities:

• Full Grade Center: this is a view created by default; it displays all columns and rows of the Grade Center
• Preview of My Grades: this view is created by default. It displays the columns visible to students.
• Final Grade View: this view is created by default. It displays all columns, including a pre-created Total Points column and a Weighted Grade column.
• Smart Views of the Grade Center; for more information on Smart Views, see Creating Smart Views in the Grade Center.
• Views by Grading Period; for more information on Grading Periods, see Grading Periods.

• Set as Default – Sets the Current View as the default View of the Grade Center.
• Sort Columns By – A drop-down menu that displays possible column sort options. For more information on sorting columns, Sorting the Grade Center.

Grade Information Bar

The Grade Information Bar row displays the pertinent information of the selected Grade Column cell in the Grade Center. Depending upon the pertinent or entered information the Grade Information Bar displays some or all of the following fields:

• The type of grade of a specific cell;  It can be one of the following:

• Weighted Grade
• Total Points
• Average Grade
• Minimum/Maximum
• Override
• Grade

For more information on Grade Types see Adding Grade Columns to the Grade Center and Calculating Grades.

Note: If an Override Grade is entered, it will take precedence over all Column types, and will display in the Grade Information Bar.

• The points possible for a gradable item
• The format of the grade. For more information on Grade Display see Creating Grading Schemas.
• If the Column is shown in the Student View. For more information see Sharing Grade Center Data.

Icon Legend

The Icon Legend, upon selection, displays the definition of the icons viewed in the Grade Center cells.

Grade Center Accessibility

In order to make the Grade Center accessible to as many people as possible, the Grade Center has two different modes, Interactive and Non-interactive. The Interactive view is the default setting.

Non-interactive view displays the Grade Center data in a simplified grid. There is no inline editing and no ability to freeze columns, making it easier to navigate by keystroke and to accommodate screen readers. When the Grade Center is first accessed by users with screen readers, users are immediately given a choice whether to enter Non-interactive view before progressing any further.

Both Non-interactive and Interactive views can move the cursor from Column to Column using the Tab key. Cells within the Grade Center can be navigated by using the up, down, left, and right arrows on a standard keyboard in both views.

Interactive view allows columns to be frozen, and has inline editing capabilities.

To manually change the Interactive view of the Grade Center to Non-interactive view, follow these steps:

1. From the Grade Center page, mouse over the icon located to the far right of the yellow bar that displays Current View and Sort Columns By functions.
2. Select Non-interactive view.

Note: This setting is not is not saved across sessions (persistent). It will last only as long as the current session. Once the browser is closed, the view will default back to Interactive.