Approving Flexible Learning Final Grades

The approver of FLEX Final Grades Entry will:

• review all aspects of the FLEX Instructor grades submission, including statistical data, attendance reports and failure reports.
• ensure if there is more than one instructor assigned to the course that the submission is from the appropriate instructor.
• if there is a concern regarding any of the grades, you must add in your comments and the grades will be returned to the Instructor who will then make the necessary changes and resubmit for approval
• have the authority to request a grade change by the instructor.
• have read-only access to failure and attendance reports.
• know the policies for your school regarding Failure and Attendance.
• contact the Operations Manager if there is a problem with Failure and Attendance requirement.
• contact the Operations Manager immediately if you are unable to complete these responsibilities for any reason (including holidays) so that an alternate can be assigned.

Grades must be approved within three (3) days of receiving the email notification that there are grades in the queue for approval.

The FLEX Final Grades Entry system will:

• not allow an Approver to be both Approver and Instructor for the same course section.
• not allow an Approver to have access at both level one and level two.
• send emails to all Approvers assigned at each level (department to decide protocol).
• allow only one Approver to approve a given course section. If there is an alternate Approver, no approval access will be available after one Approver has started.
• send an automated email to the Operations Manager if no Approver exists for a course section. The Operations Manager is responsible for moving this section to the appropriate approvers queue and notifying them.
• not allow Approvers to change attendance or failure reports.
• ensure Approvers supply comments when returning the course section back to the instructor for editing
• assign valid grades by individual course section determined by the grade mode.
• not allow a grade outside of the valid grade mode.
• not allow a blank grade.
• track all changes within Banner, these changes will be retrievable through Cognos reports.
• allow for submission of more than one course at a time by using the Submit Bundle button.
• not allow changes by either Instructor or Approver once a grade has been rolled to history by student records in the system.

In your browser:

1. Go to my.bcit.ca and login using your usual BCIT login credentials (BCIT email address and password).
2. Follow the links to Employee Self-Service > PTS Final Grades Approval.
3. The Final Grades Approval Summary screen may include a message from the instructor, under the heading Latest Instructor Comment.
   
4. To view all comments between the instructor and approver, use the See All link. The instructor will also see the same comments in the email received when the approver sends back the grades.
5. Then select one of the following options:
   • Proceed with approving the class by clicking on the Approve Marks box.
   • Return the class list to the Instructor by utilizing the Send Back to Instructor box including comments.
   • Select the Term/CRN link to view the full class list in the Verification and Approval Screen and gather more information.

If there is a Failure Report associated with a student, there will be a Yes link under the Failure Report heading.

1. Click Yes to open and review each Failure Report.
   
   • Ensure that all components, weightings and marks are included.
   • Ensure that the Final Grade in the failure report is the same as in the Verification and Approval form. (If Banner Gradebook is not used then component marks are entered manually and could be subject to error).In this example, everything is in order:
     • The Total Weight is 100.
     • The Final Grade matches what is displayed on the Verification and Approval Screen.
2. Click the Done button to return to the Verification and Approval Screen.

If there is an Attendance Report associated with a student, there will be a Yes link under the Attendance Report heading.

1. Click Yes to open and review each Attendance Report.
   • Be especially diligent with those that correspond to a failing grade as it may impact your decision.
   • If there are no YES links under Attendance in your class list then either no one missed any days or Attendance is not mandatory for this section.
2. Click the Done button to return to the Verification and Approval Screen.

Based on the information contained in both the failure and attendance report, you now make a decision as to whether or not to approve the grade(s) as submitted.

If you decide to send the grades back to the Instructor, you need to either select one of the predefined comments for Approvers or add your own.

Once you’ve entered your comments, click Send Back to Instructor.

• Note: If you can’t find the appropriate comment in the list and would like to have it added, please contact flex@bcit.ca.
• The instructor is sent an e-mail including your comments. The instructor must login to the Final Grades Entry system to resubmit.

1. To approve the grades, click Approve Marks
   • An e-mail is sent to the 2nd Approver if one exists.
   • If there is no 2nd Approver, an e-mail is sent to Student Records. Student records will roll the grades to history and at this point the grades will be available for viewing by the students.
2. If you have more than one course to approve, the other courses will be displayed on the next screen. If there are no other courses in your queue, you will see that you have 0/0 to approve.
   • Note: The Submit Bundle button gives the Approver the option of submitting more than one course at a time. Simply click Approve or Send Back to Instructor boxes and then Submit Bundle.
3. Once you have completed your approvals, remember to return the Main Menu and logout of myBCIT.

When instructors submit final grades for a CRN (course reference number) which have no Approver(s) set up, the grades will default to the queue of the Operations Manager for your school. If you have missing final grades, here’s what you should do:

1. Check that you have the correct FG approvers displaying in Banner form SWASAPP. If there are approvers showing, check the queue of the level 1 approver in Banner form SWARCTL.
2. If the FGs are in the wrong queue, they can be switched to the correct person’s queue by contacting your Ops Manager, should they be unavailable contact flex@bcit.ca with the appropriate information.

• • Note: When manually switching FG queues, there is no automated messaging to the person whom they’ve been moved to; and also they do not proceed to a level 2 approval – they go directly to Records to be rolled to history.

The grades are visible to the students in their myBCIT portal once rolled to history by Student Records. To view the grades go to SFASLST, enter term and CRN and then below the Sequence you will see “Rolled” if the little box next to it is checked this means that the grades have been rolled to the student’s history.

• If the instructor has provided an inappropriate Final Grade(s) (FGs), or failure and/or attendance reports are missing, reject the FGs. This will return the FGs for the course to the instructor’s myBCIT queue for amending. You will not be able to reject the FGs without providing a reason for the rejection in the comment to instructor box.

• Instructor is using Banner Gradebook and a student’s FG won’t calculate in FLEX Final Grades Entry. This is a result of the instructor using the ‘Must Pass’ function in setting up the Gradebook. The instructor must return to their Gradebook set-up and remove the Must Pass flag from any components. Once this correction has been made, the FG for the student should calculate correctly in FG Entry. The grades then go to the second approver level for approval (if applicable).

• Remember only Student Records can input W (Withdrawal) or LW (Late Withdrawal) these are not inputted by Instructors.

If you have difficulties, comments or suggestions for improvement to this document, contact flex@bcit.ca.