Grades | How to create a grade scheme
A grade scheme enables you to organize learners performance on grade items into levels of achievement. It can include any number of achievement levels, and each achievement level has its own range of acceptable grades and a symbol (such as a numeric value, letter, or text description) to represent it. The Schemes tab lets you review organizational schemes created by your administration and lets instructors create and edit custom schemes for a course. (Source: D2L)
This article shows:
What are grade schemes
Grade schemes are the way grades are displayed to students. Grade schemes allow grades to be presented as text, customized grade ranges or grades rounded to a certain percentage.
A grade scheme enables you to organise users' performance on grade items into levels of achievement. Each level of achievement has its own range of acceptable grades that fall within that range. Each range has a symbol to represent it, which can be text, a letter or a number.
In the example above, students will fall into the 'Fail' range if their grade is below 5.5 points (or 55% of the total grade), and will receive a 'Very good' if their grade is between 7 points and 8.4 (or 70 and 84% of the grade).
At an organisational level, there are 5 grade schemes already available by default in your Brightspace:
- 1-10 decimal scheme for partial grades. Minimum grade to pass is 5 points.
- 1-10 decimal scheme for partial grades. Minimum grade to pass is 5.5 points.
- 1-10 decimal scheme for partial grades. No minimum grade.
- Pass/fail scheme.
- WUR-grading, which rounds grades according the exam regulations. This is usually only used for final grades.
How to create a grade scheme
You can create personalised grade schemes for your course.
1. In the navigation bar of the course, click on Grades, this will open the grade book
2. In the grade book, click on Schemes
3. Click on New Scheme
- Enter a name for the new grade scheme
- (Optional) Give the scheme a short name to be displayed in places with limited space.
In the Ranges area, enter your scheme details.
- Enter the name (symbol) of the different ranges.
You can add more ranges clicking in Add Ranges
The first range is always the lowest value. Build your scheme from the lowest to the highest grade.
- (Optional) Add Assigned value % to your ranges
- (Optional) Associate a colour with each range. Your grade book will be colour-coded accordingly.
- The Start percentage is the minimum grade needed to fall into a grade range.
- The Assigned Value percentage is where you enter the numeric grade you want learners to achieve.
For example, taking the ranges from the picture above, students will receive the following grades based on their points:
- 5 = C+
- 6,9 = B
- 8,5 = A-
- 10 = A
Note: if you do not enter an Assigned Value %, the Start % is used by default. Meaning that the start Assigned Value % will be the same as the Start % (See image below). Nonetheless, the Start % will still be kept as the reference, so for example if a student gets an 8,5 the grade will be A- as it has not reach 9, Start % of the next range.
- Click on Save and Close
Your personalised grade scheme is now created and can be used in grade items!
Now you know how to create a grade scheme in Brightspace!
Related topics
Do you want to know more about grades in Brightspace?
Please visit: