[Gradebook Settings] Course Level Grading Period Control

[polzinc]

Currently, Canvas Grade Periods must be set at the Account Admin level. However, this doesn’t work in a K-12 environment.  We have schools that enroll students in courses that run by year, semester, or quarter.  Some of our teachers or departments weigh the quarters or average them to create their final grade, while others keep a running total.  Our SIS gradebook allows for this option, but it is not possible in Canvas for the teachers to set their gradebook up the same way.  As a result, it creates discrepancies between the 2 gradebooks if teachers insist on splitting up their quarter gradebooks within the course.

Ask:

• Ability for teachers to choose to have their Semester long Gradebook divided into 2 grading periods. 
• The option for the grading periods to be averaged, weighted, or simply use a running total.

[Stef_retired]

@polzinc 

Thanks for sharing this idea. As it moves forward for broader discussion, have you (or your school admin, if you're not the admin) considered using a combination of terms and different grading period sets to accommodate this variety of course-level use cases? Please read through How do I add grading periods in an account? - Canvas Community for more information.

[polzinc]

At the District Level, if I set up the grading periods into Quarter 1 and Quarter 2 and select Semester 1 for instance as the term to apply it to, then all accounts enrolled in Semester 1 have the same grading periods applied.  We then cannot apply another Grading Period Option to the same term.  We would like this to be an option at the course level. 

[patrickemaus]

There should be a "Start New Grading Period" option.

When manually creating a course, there is no way to end the grading period and continue into a new grading period using the same course.  You need to be using a district issued course where the district sets the dates of the grading periods or you have to start a new course and re-cross list your students.  

It would be nice to be able to end a marking period and start fresh with a new marking period with grades being 0 out of 0.