Calculating Final Attendance Score

[seekingcanvas]

I'm unfamiliar with using the Roll Call/Attendance feature in Canvas and need guidance on handling a specific attendance grading scenario for my course. We have a total of ten mandatory class events. To meet the attendance requirement, students must attend at least 8 out of these 10 events, equating to an 80% attendance rate by the end of the course. My goal is to award 100 points for attendance to students who achieve an 80% attendance rate or higher and assign a score of "0" to those who fall below this threshold.

Is there a way to automatically configure Canvas to apply these attendance grading criteria? If this automatic configuration isn't possible, what would be the best workaround, such as exporting the final attendance report and manually calculating the scores?

[NicoletteStaley · Accepted solution]

@seekingcanvas Unfortunately, it is not possible o configure the Rollcall assignment to calculate the grades as you suggest (80% or above earns a grade of 100%, less than 80% earns a grade of zero).  To achieve this, I recommend that you exclude the Rollcall assignment from the final grade calculation and then create an additional assignment in the course that is used to calculate the actual attendance grade.  At the end of the term, you could manually enter a score of either 100 or 0 for students based on the score displayed for them in Rollcall.

[NicoletteStaley · Accepted solution]

@seekingcanvas Unfortunately, it is not possible o configure the Rollcall assignment to calculate the grades as you suggest (80% or above earns a grade of 100%, less than 80% earns a grade of zero).  To achieve this, I recommend that you exclude the Rollcall assignment from the final grade calculation and then create an additional assignment in the course that is used to calculate the actual attendance grade.  At the end of the term, you could manually enter a score of either 100 or 0 for students based on the score displayed for them in Rollcall.

[seekingcanvas]

@NicoletteStaley - is another workaround to directly modify the attendance grade in the gradebook? the procedure would be:

1. Locate the "Roll Call Attendance Column"
2. Manual Score Entry:
1. Enter “100” for students who have a score above 80%
2. Enter “0” for students below the 80% attendance threshold.

Unless I am missing something, it looks like doing this does automatically adjusts the far right "Attendance" column in the final grade calculation within the gradebook. 

[James · Accepted solution]

@seekingcanvas 

I believe that you would need to make sure that no more attendance gets entered into RollCall to use that trick. Most external tools consider themselves authoritative for that assignment's grade and would override any manual entries you made.

Instead, I would recommend the approach that @NicoletteStaley recommended. You can make that extra assignment with no-submission and then explain how the grading works. Another benefit of the second attendance grade is that you can leave it blank until the attendance is done, or put a 0 in as soon as people drop below it -- your choice. With Roll Call Attendance, it would change the grade with each day you take attendance, so the student might have 75% grade there (overinflating their score) when they should have 0. That second assignment also allows the student to see their actual attendance percentage rather than just the binary 100 or 0. That gives them a warning as they go that they are getting close.

As Nicolette mentioned, for the Roll Call Attendance assignment, you should edit the assignment and check the box to not count it towards the final grade. Otherwise, you end up counting attendance twice. If you have a weighted gradebook, then another option is to create a category worth 0% of the grade and then move the Roll Call Attendance to that assignment group.

[seekingcanvas]

Thanks so much @NicoletteStaley and @James - with your guidance I was able to set this up successfully 🙂