Importing grades from a spreadsheet

Note: To complete these procedures, you must be assigned a role having the necessary permissions. To determine your role, follow the directions in Participant roles. For a basic understanding of roles and permissions, see Permissions and roles: Overview.

In Gradebook, you can import grades in two different ways:

• Import an entire spreadsheet. This method overwrites any existing grades in the Gradebook for columns with the same name as existing gradebook items, while creating new gradebook items for any columns that do not match existing gradebook items.
  
  
• Import individual gradebook items. This method creates new gradebook items for each spreadsheet column you import. You cannot import any columns with the same name as existing gradebook items.

You can also use the Post'Em tool to upload a .csv spreadsheet of grades (and feedback, if desired) that students can view; see Using the Post'Em tool.

Note: You cannot import grades for gradebook items added from the Assignments tool; see Linking an assignment to the Gradebook.

Importing an entire spreadsheet

1. In your site's menubar, click Gradebook.
   
   
2. Near the top, click Import Grades.
   
   
3. Download the spreadsheet template by clicking Download Spreadsheet Template, choosing Save File, and clicking OK.
   
   
4. Edit the spreadsheet in a spreadsheet application, such as Excel, and save it as a .csv or .xls file.
   
   
5. Import the spreadsheet by clicking Browse... and choosing the .csv or .xls file.
   
   
6. After selecting the file, click Import Spreadsheet.
   
   
7. The following page should show the imported grades. When you are finished, click OK.

When using this option, it's best to download the spreadsheet template provided, as instructed in step 3 above. You can upload a different spreadsheet in .csv or .xls format instead, but if you do, format it as closely as possible to the template. The first column should contain individuals' usernames, and the first row should contain headings, with the title and point value for each gradebook item as in this example:

Essay 1 [100.0]

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Importing individual gradebook items

To import gradebook items, first create a .csv or .xls spreadsheet file containing columns of point-based scores, and then upload it to the Gradebook Loading Dock. The first row of your spreadsheet must contain headings for the columns it contains. The first column must contain individuals' usernames.

Once you have your .csv or .xls file ready for upload:

Uploading a file to the Loading Dock

1. In your site's menubar, click Gradebook.
   
   
2. Near the top, click Import gradebook item from spreadsheet.
   
   
3. On the Import Gradebook Item screen, click Upload spreadsheet (csv or xls format) to Loading Dock.
   
   
4. In the field next to "Title", type a unique name to be displayed in the Loading Dock.
   
   
5. To select a file for upload, click Browse. Find the file on your computer, click its name, and then click Open.
   
   
6. Click Save.
   
   
7. On the Verify Upload screen, review the number of items and students for your upload, and view a display of the file's contents. If the content is correct, click Ok. If you need to select another file, click Back.

Once a file is uploaded to the Loading Dock, its contents become available to import as a new gradebook item. To import an uploaded file's contents as a new gradebook item:

Importing a column from a file in the Loading Dock

1. On the Import Gradebook Item screen, find your newly uploaded file in the Loading Dock, and next to it, click Import.
   
   
2. On the Import Preview screen, click the radio button to select the column that represents the gradebook item and corresponding scores you want to import. (You can select only one at a time.) Then click Import Selected.
   
   
3. On the Import Gradebook Item and Scores screen, enter the following information:
   
   
   • Title: The title you provided in the steps above is automatically filled in. If you didn't provide a title earlier, you need to provide one here. The maximum length is 255 characters.
     
     
   • Gradebook Item Point Value: Enter a total point value for the gradebook item. This must be greater than zero. Decimal values are permitted to two decimal places.
     
     
   • Due Date: In mm/dd/yy format, indicate the item's due date, or click the calendar icon ( 
     
      ) to select a date using the pop-up calendar tool. This field is not required.
     
     
   • Select a column to import comments: If a column in your file contains comments, use the drop-down list to select the appropriate column, and add the comments to the import. Comments will appear next to the grades in the Gradebook. This field is not required.
   
   
4. To make this item's scores available to students, select Release this Item to Students. You can deselect this later, if necessary.
   
   
5. To include this item when calculating the course grade, select Include this item in course grade calculations. You can deselect this later, if necessary.
   
   
6. When you're finished, click Submit. You'll return to the Import Preview screen, where you'll see confirmation that your item was added. You can now select another item for import, or click the reset icon ( 
   
    ) to return to the main screen; see The reset button. You should see your imported assignment(s) listed under "Gradebook Items Summary".

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