How to Submit Canvas Grades to OGS at the End of the Term

These instructions are for instructors and others with permission to assign grades in Canvas and OGS.

Overview

By default, final grades are calculated automatically in Canvas based on the default grading scheme. You may add or edit a grading scheme via Settings. The main way most Canvas instructors will submit grades is importing to OGS from Canvas. This process involves going to the Online Grading System (OGS), then importing the grades into OGS from Canvas. This works similarly to how Stellar Gradebook grades are imported to OGS.

Other instructors may choose to override grades in Canvas or manually import their grades into OGS using a spreadsheet (e.g., it’s a section site or doesn’t have a SIS ID, or if they want to alter the grades before uploading). This means transforming the export format Canvas uses into an input format that can be accepted by OGS. This largely involves removing extraneous data Canvas exports that OGS does not understand how to process. It includes adding or modifying the final grade column, and reformatting the remaining data to match what OGS wants (e.g., Canvas has a single “name” field, but OGS wants a “last name”, “first name”, and “middle” field).

Manually Overriding Grades in Canvas

In order to manually override the calculation of grades in canvas, you must do the following things in your course settings:

1. Go to https://canvas.mit.edu and navigate to your course.
2. Enable Final Grade Override in Settings > Feature Options
3. Enable Allow Final Grade Grade Override in Grades > Gear Icon (settings) > Advanced Settings
   Result: An "Override" column appears where you can enter the desired course grade regardless of assignment grade totals. You can import from OGS normally once you enter the desired grades in the Override column.

Exporting grades to OGS (Online Grade Submission)

1. If you would like to import grades from from Canvas to OGS, there are two places to access the import grades function within the OGS application:
   1. On the Main Menu, click “Manage Imports.”
   2. Go to a subject gradesheet and click the “Import Grades” button at the bottom of the screen.
2. A dialog box will appear asking if you wish to import grades from Stellar's gradebook, a local source, or Canvas. Select the “Canvas” radio button.
3. After selecting Canvas, the system will display a dropdown menu to select your subject.

In rare cases, a class might not be available to import from Canvas. In such cases, you may use a manual import option in OGS. More information about grade submission can be found here.

Turning the Canvas grades export format into OGS Format

For those who can’t or don’t want to use the OGS import-from-Canvas functionality, you must transform the grades format Canvas exports into the
input format accepted by OGS. There are two main ways to do this:

• You can create a spreadsheet in Excel (or another spreadsheet program) in the required format and manually enter the data.
• You can transform an export from Cavnas into the correct format as follows.

How to turn Canvas gradebook export into an OGS importable file

OGS has a particular import format it expects, which you can preview here.

The following method using Excel is one possible way to produce this format from the Canvas grade export.

1. Go to https://canvas.mit.edu and navigate to your course.
2. In the left-hand column, select Grades.
   Result: The course gradebook will open (the URL will look something like this: https://canvas.mit.edu/courses/3631/gradebook),
3. Go to the Actions dropdown and choose Export Entire Gradebook.
   Result: This may take some time, but will eventually produce a .CSV file.
4. Open the .CSV file in Excel.
5. Check at the bottom row to see if "Student, Test" is in the class. If so, delete the row.
6. Delete the second header row (row 2).
7. Add a column at the end called "Grade" and fill it with the desired letter grade you want to assign, based on whatever calculations you want to do with the grade information in the rest of the spreadsheet.
8. Save a copy here so you can restart from this step if necessary.
9. Change the header of Column A from "Student" to "Last Name, First Name"
10. Select column A and hit ctrl-H (or choose Find/Replace). Replace all ", " (comma followed by space) with "," (just a comma)
11. Select column A again, then go to the Data menu and choose "Text to Columns" to start the Convert Text to Columns Wizard:
    • in Step 1, choose Delimited and push the Next button.
    • in Step 2, choose Comma as the only delimiter and push Finish.
    • Accept the dialog box that says there's already data there; it's okay to replace column B's contents.
12. Insert an empty column between B and C (becomes the new C) and give the header "Middle"
13. Change the header for column D from "SIS User ID" to "MIT ID"
14. Delete the SIS Login ID column (column E)
15. Delete all the columns after "Section" and before the "Grade" column you created in step 7.
16. Insert an empty column between D and E and name the header "Subject #". 
17. Change the header of column F from "Section" to "Section #".
18. You should now make the contents of the "Subject #" and "Section #" columns match what OGS expects (format example here):
    • The "Subject #" column should contain the subject ID for the subject in every row.
    • The "Section #" column should be blank in every row.
19. Column G should be the “Grade” column.
20. Give column H the header "Units" and column I the header "Comment" and put the appropriate values in them as applicable.
    • If a subject is fixed units (e.g.,12 units), the "Units" column can be left blank.
    • "Comments" are not required. This column can be used if desired.
21. Save this as a .CSV file.
22. Go to https://ogs.mit.edu and do your import with it.
    Note that there may be errors; it's possible that the student first and last names known to Canvas do not match those required by OGS, so you might have to make changes there.

See Also

• MIT Canvas Landing Page
• If you need assistance with the OGS system, see: https://registrar.mit.edu/systems-help or contact the Registrar's Office.