Blackboard has a state-of-the-art Grade Center you can use to generate a final grade, which may save you tons of time towards the end of the semester.    There are two ways you can arrive at your final grade:

• Total:  You can have a lump sum “total” grade which will add up all raw scores in your course, provided that you have all the columns created for the assessment activities in this course.   When you are in the “Grade Center”, you will see a column called “total”, which adds up all grades for you.  You can also customize it by clicking on the option icon beside it, choose “edit column information”, select “selected columns and categories” and then select only the column or categories you need.
• Weighted Total:  You can have a “weighted total” column that generates a weighted score, based on weighting you assign for various categories of assessments.  To arrive at this weighted total, you have to make sure you  put all items in their proper categories.  Below is the general procedure for generating a “weighted total”.

Creating a “weighted total” final score:

1. Make sure your course has all the “categories” you need.   Blackboard by default has a few commonly used categories such as “assignment” and “test”, but if you use additional categories, such as “quiz”, go to “manage”, and then “categories” to create specific categories by pressing the “create category” button.
2. Check to make sure that all items are assigned to the proper categories.  The best way to do so is to go to the Grade Center, click on “manage” and then “column organization”, which will display all items and the categories they belong to.   If items are not correctly assigned to the right categories,  check the boxes besides these items, move to the top of the page, and find “change category to…” to assign or re-assign an item or a group of items to the right category.  Remember to click on “submit” to save your change.
3. Now you are ready to generate your weighted total score.   Go back to the main page of the Grade Center,  click on the option icon beside “weighted total”, select “edit column information”,  select the category, and click on the right-facing arrow button to add the category to the big box under “selected columns”.  Once you do that, you will be able to assign the percentage to the category, such as 40% for assignments, 10% for quizzes, etc.  You will also notice that you can drop a fixed number of lowest grades if you choose to do so.  Keep adding categories and weights until they add up to 100%.   Click on “submit” to complete it.

This is a fairly easy process to go through once you become familiar with the rationale.   Of course there are quite a number of ways this process can go wrong, which cause you or your students to doubt whether the final grade thus calculated is correct.    I can assure you that the math of Blackboard works as well as Excel or any other calculation device you may use, except that is easier to change in Blackboard.    When problems occur, it may be related to the setting of specific items or categories.   Here are a few tips you might want to consider to avoid some issues:

1. Make sure you do not have many redundant grade columns that are contributing towards the final grade without you knowing it.  Sometimes you have certain columns hidden, but they still play a role in your grade calculation as they are assigned to specific categories.  You should check under “manage” and then “column organization” to see exactly how many columns you have.  If you have a redundant column you don’t need any more, delete it or assign it to “no category” to make sure they do not skew your grades.
2. Make sure  all items are being calculated.   When you create any column, you are given the option to “Include this Column in Grade Center Calculations”.  If you have inadvertently chosen “no”, it could cause a column to escape from the calculation, which also skew the final score.  That’s where I would look if a particular category of items do not add up correctly.
3. You may also find it very convenient that Blackboard Grade Center allows you do directly calculate the letter grade for your class.   To do that,  go to the Grade Center, click on the option icon beside “weighted total”, and then for “primary display”, choose “letter” from the drop-down menu.  Or you can have “percentage” for your primary display and “letter” for your secondary display.   Blackboard comes with a grading schema that translates percentages to letter grades.  This is a schema you can edit (manage –> grading schemas–option icon–>edit) or you can create a new schema for yourself.

All of these processes seem very complex when I write it down in words.  If it seems confusing or intimidating, please simply come to the North Institute and we can help you to set it up in a fairly short time.   Please also let us know if you think you have set it up correctly while students complain of issues.   Thanks.