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I have a faculty member who has about 20 quizzes worth 10 points each and at the end of the semester she wants to add up the 10 highest scores so that 100 is the highest grade the student can receive. Can anyone tell me how to do this in a calculated column.

Hi,

The calculated column type is only best for the simplest of calculations such as straight sums of all values and basic average.

To do anything beyond "dropping the single lowest score", the instructor's best option is to download the grades and use a spreadsheet such as Microsoft Excel, Apple Numbers or Open Office Calc.

Cheers,

Bob

When I've copied Gradebook grades and pasted them into an Excel spreadsheet, I got nonsense (i.e., all the grades were in one giant cell). How have people successfully imported grades into a spreadsheet and keeping all the same columns, rows, and formattiting stuff?

David,

Unlike earlier WebCT CE 4.1, trying to copy and paste the Grade Book into an Excel spreadsheet does not work very well unless you go through some extra steps to parse out the block of text that is stored on the clipboard.

The best option is to use "Export to Spreadsheet" at the bottom of the Grade Sheet to create a CSV file that can be opened in Excel.

Cheers,

Bob

You can do this a couple of ways:

1. The Painful, Drop Lowest Scores Method (explained here with dropping 2): http://jaredstein.org/2008/12/16/dropping-lowest-2-scores-in-blackboard-or-moodle/

OR

2. Create a calculated column that looks like this:

MIN{(Q1+Q2+Q3+Q4+Q5+Q6...),100}

Where Qi = a quiz. Note that the parenthetical can be replaced with another calculated column that simply sums up all the quizzes, so that'd look like this:

MIN{[Quizzes],100}

This 2nd method does not take the highest scores, but rather sets the max points possible at 100.

The 'Export to Spreadsheet' button is only available if you have the right permissions to the container - basic access to the gradebook doesn't give you the export button.