[Gradebook Settings] Gradual automatic late penalties

There are several added flexibilities I would like to see added to the late penalty policy, as a correction to the apparent unfairness described by Timothy Lim, "The automatic late submission penalty is a useful feature. However, it's a bit of blunt instrument. Specifically, presently, there appears to be no way to distinguish between a student who submits an assignment even one minute past the deadline and another student who submits 23 hours and 59 minutes past the deadline."

 

I'd like to see the late penalty applied more gradually, and I believe these ideas offer canvas a quick way to graduate the late penalty:

  • I'd like to have two decimal places added to the percentage deduction so that I could graduate the late penalty by applying 0.25% per hour instead of 6% per day. (1% per hour = 24% per day which is far more severe than I'd like.)
  • Canvas already tracks lateness as #.## days, and I would like to have the same two decimal places with which to decide the frequency of late penalty multiples, again so that I can gradually apply the penalty. For example, 0.05% per 0.01 days instead of 5% per day.

The second point would be even better if the late penalty options included a simple check box that would cause the daily or hourly penalty to be gradually and evenly applied using the smallest increment of time measured by canvas.  That would reduce set up calculations for the instructors.

 

Edited to remove duplication of:

https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/14976-more-late-penalty-options (which would allow weekends and holidays to be skipped, and make a grace period possible before late penalties apply)

https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/4670-late-grades-option-toggle (which would allow individual assignments to be excluded) and

https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/10441-separate-late-policies-for-individual-assignments (which more specifically allows individual late policies to be created for individual assignments.)

16 Comments
Stef_retired
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

Hi, steven, have you evaluated https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/14976-more-late-penalty-options , which is currently open for voting? It incorporates several of your requests. Please let us know. We'll keep this idea in Moderating status for the moment.

Thanks!

Steven_S
Community Champion
Author

Thanks I had not seen that one.  It does incorporate the first two ideas in my list, but it does not include the ideas for gradually applying the late penalty.  I can remove those first two ideas if that helps...

Stef_retired
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

Yes, that would definitely help, steven‌! If you could edit the idea to remove the duplication, we will open it for voting.

Steven_S
Community Champion
Author

OK.  That part is removed

Stef_retired
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

Thanks, steven; we're getting there. Smiley Happy With respect to your last bullet point, that's already addressed by https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/10441-separate-late-policies-for-individual-assignments" modif..., which is currently open for voting. Would you take that last part out?

Stef_retired
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

...and we're there! The revised idea is now open for voting.

soren_riber
Community Explorer

Our internal school policy is anything late will receive a 1 grade band deduction. Would be great to have have more flexibility around this, we would love to use the feature, but not currently possible.

Let the user determine exactly the penalty and exactly when it applies and at what rate it increases (in ours 0 increase). 

Steven_S
Community Champion
Author

 @soren_riber  This is a flexibility I have seen requested several times.  You may want to support https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/15409-late-grade-maximum-deduction-not-minimum-grade because this idea could be applied to your situation.  If that idea is applied a maximum % deduction could be set to be the same as the per day deduction, and then canvas would match your internal policy.  Currently, the selection of a "l

stephanie_estes
Community Explorer

Trying to shoehorn this idea in here, because I think this is the closest thread I can find for this:  I would like to be able to skip weekends on late penalties. It would be great to deduct a percentage per day late and check a box for "skip weekends."  

The current settings sound great for Higher Ed, but for young children who live with their families, weekends are family time.  It's my feeling (others may differ) that penalizing them for late work on weekends is kind of harsh.  

What do you say?  

cbb22
Community Member

It would be really helpful if the late submission penalty option in speed grader had more functionality. In other words, I'd like to be able to take off a certain number of points, and also be able to deduct the penalty by weeks—currently, the only option is to deduct by percentage (which doesn't work for how I grade) and to do so by day/hour, which makes using this tool prohibitive for the policy I have. Could we have more freedom in customizing this function?