Automatic zero in gradebook after a date

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

  

I would like to throw this out there...

 

What if an assignment could automatically be scored as a zero if not completed by a specified date? This would be a huge time saver for everyone:

 

Student: this would allow their grade to accurately reflect true grade (if teacher is behind)- will encourage/motivate, etc.

Teacher: huge time saver! Helpful for schools/teachers with students who self pace

Academic Adviser: view true and accurate grade for reporting

 

Currently, a teacher can default an assignment grade (for all or some students) to a zero. But what if on the same prompt (window) it asks for a date. When the date passes, a zero in placed in the grade. This gives the teacher control of when it happens and it's easy to find.

 

Just an idea.

 

Comments from Instructure

 

For more information, please read through the https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-13886 .

74 Comments
kona
Community Coach
Community Coach

What I manually do myself is that for certain types of assignments I take off 20% per day. This isn't the case for all assignments though, so it would be nice to customize which assignments were graded this way. For those that I don't accept late, it would be great to have the option to have a zero automatically added to the gradebook.

It would also be pretty awesome if at the due date the student was given a zero if they haven't turned anything in and then if they did - say a quiz that is automatically graded - Canvas would automatically change the grade from a zero to whatever their grade was minus the 20% off per day.

Ron_Bowman
Community Champion

Deactivated user​

This post and some of the responses I have seen have finally pointed out an obvious fact: K-12 is going to have different issues/requirements than at a higher education institution.  I enforce my late policy by using the until date to shut off submissions, and my time frame is 2 hours (this is for online submissions) with a 10% penalty.  In class submissions I handle differently.

I agree with  @kona  It would be nice if Canvas would automatically assess a late penalty - either by points or percentage for a late assignment.

Ron

jbuchner
Community Contributor

Missing assignments aught to be the exception, not the rule, so assigning a "0" is a flag to the student, saying 'Hey! better see if you can fix this!" As far as penalties in my class go, it's usually some value (-5 points off per day) until the value of the assignment is truly 0. I wouldn't want the grade book auto-filled in with -5, or 95/100 for a late assignment. The first looks like a penalty added on to missing an assignment, and the 2nd looks like I've given the student a grade.

millerjm
Community Champion

Hi Deactivated user​, I actually do something that I learned from another instructor: 

  • If assignment or quiz is early (turned in before the actual due date), they get 5% bonus
  • If the assignment is turned on ON the actual due date, then no bonus
  • If they assignment is late, they can turn it in up to 5 days late and I take 15% off, in addition to any other deductions

I'm not teaching this term, but in Sakai I had to manually adjust the scores on all of the tests based on when they were turned in.

stephanie_pope
Community Champion
Author

Hello Deactivated user,

Our policy is assignments can be up to 2 weeks late (grace). After 2 weeks a student can only earn up to 80%. If an assignment is not completed by the third week, a zero is entered for the assignment. This time frame is extremely gracious to our students, but makes it horrendous for our advisers and teachers to track real-time progress. This gap of time leave a lot of gray area.

I'm exciting and looking forward to the development of this idea. Thank you to everyone for their amazing ideas to make this feature even better!

Stephanie

cwruck
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

I love this feature request. We are working on some gradebook enhancements this fall that will lay the foundation to accommodate setting up late rules. I would love it if you and everyone you know would join this group Grading Late Rules to help us fully scope the potential for this feature. That’s the good news. The less good news is, we won’t actually get to implementing this feature in the next 6 months… which by our community rules means we have to archive the idea. But please don’t think that that means we’re not going to do this. This feature is literally on the top of my list of things to tackle as soon as we’ve finished our first round gradebook enhancements… which as I mentioned, lays the foundation for setting these rules up in the gradebook settings. I can’t wait to learn more about all your policies.

Renee_Carney
Community Team
Community Team

This idea is now Under Consideration.  Find out more about the idea stages at What is the feature development process for Canvas?

stephanie_pope
Community Champion
Author

This is awesome! A great feature for teachers! Thanks everyone!

Stephanie

cwruck
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

Hey Folks!

I hope you noticed our new status. "Under Consideration". It means, we think this is a good idea and despite the fact that we can't get this done in the next 6 months, we're looking for ways to squeeze it in sometime in the future. We'll be working on some designs, are still collecting feedback here: What are your late rules? and will be hoping some of you on this chain will want to participate in some user testing to make sure we're on the right track to solving this problem. Stay tuned!

schutt_j
Community Novice

ABSOLUTELY. I was just searching how this could be done. I hope that this feature is added soon.

To recap... I have deadlines by which students need to take a quiz. I want a grade of "0" added automatically for those students who have not taken the quiz. This way students will see their proper course grade/percent. I do NOT want all grades to automatically start at 0. This records their current grades incorrectly... and they shouldn't have a grade of 0 for something that they've not done yet. (Nor, for that matter, should their grade start at 100%.) It should start as _blank_.

Please? Soon?