Policies, Procedures & Guidelines

Grading & Feedback

Note: The following was approved by the Schulich Faculty Council in November 2019 and is effective as of the Winter 2020 term.

Grades provide students with important feedback on their understanding of the course material and mastery of learning outcomes, and where they need to improve. Grading also provides instructors with feedback that can be used to make subsequent decisions about teaching, either within the semester, or for following iterations of the course. It can therefore be helpful to consider grading as part of the larger process of learning and assessment, rather than as a matter of determining a student’s standing in class.

Effective grading involves a sequence of activities, including:

• establishing clear expectations through grading policies
• designing assessments that measure the achievement of learning objectives / outcomes
• establishing benchmarks and criteria for marking that reflect the student’s mastery of the learning outcomes
• calibrating for consistency, fairness and adherence to relevant policies, and
• providing useful feedback that helps students understand what they know or can do, and how they can improve

Grading and Formative Feedback

Grading Guidelines

1. Class participation should not account for more than 20% of the final grade. Exceptions to this guideline should be supported by a clear rationale. Instructors are encouraged to offer a diverse set of participation opportunities to account for differences in how students effectively communicate. Beyond traditional oral participation, the use of discussion boards, small group settings, class activities such as polls, and the video conferencing chat function in a virtual class should be considered.
2. Due dates for assignments should generally not fall within the set final examination period.
3. When presenting an assignment and returning marked work of qualitative nature, it is recommended that students receive a copy of the grading standards or marking rubric to avoid the perception of unfair grading practices and ensure transparency with regards to how marks are assigned. Rubrics explicitly state grading criteria and link grades to the learning goals of an assignment and course.
4. Instructors are encouraged to provide regular opportunities for formative feedback throughout their course. Formative feedback helps students identify their strengths and target areas to focus on while there is still time remaining in the course for improvement. Providing shorter but more regular feedback creates a continuous dialogue between students and instructors that manages students’ expectations and develops their reflective skills.
5. If marks are allocated for participation, instructors should be transparent about how these marks will be determined. The inclusion of mark descriptors in the course outline (that indicate what students need to do to earn a particular participation mark) will clearly convey an instructor’s expectations right from the start of the course. It is also recommended that instructors provide students with ongoing feedback regarding their participation. Mid-term check-ins, for example, will ensure students are not surprised by their result at the end of the course.
6. Please also refer the Faculty’s course design guidelines.

Grading Policies

1. The components of the Schulich course outline template should be included in all course outlines. In addition to the items included in this template, course outlines should include the following information:

   • A description of the components (attendance, quality and quantity of contributions) upon which the participation mark will be based and how these components will be weighted;
   • A grading scale. If the instructor uses percentage scores, the grading scale must include a translation of the percentage score to a letter grade or index value (see examples below);
   • A statement as to whether grades will be curved and / or rounded in some way.
2. The course outline should be made available one month prior to the start of the course.
3. With the exception of courses explicitly required for certification by a professional body, or other exceptions agreed to by Senate, students pass or fail a course on the basis of their final course average, without the additional requirement of having to obtain a passing grade on a final examination. This policy does not exclude the possibility of a final examination representing more than 50% of the final grade in a particular course or the requirement that a student pass a specific course lab component.
4. Students should receive graded feedback worth at least 15% of the final grade for 3.00 credit courses prior to the withdrawal date from a course without academic penalty. (This policy does not apply to 1.50 credit courses, courses on a compressed schedule, practicum courses, or courses where the coursework typically consists of a single deliverable.)
5. No examinations or tests (in‐class or take‐home) collectively worth more than 20% of the course grade are permitted during the final 14 calendar days of classes in any Schulich course (Excepted are courses that run on weekends, courses in compressed terms, and courses with 6.0 or more contact hours per week.) An assignment is not considered a take‐home examination if students have at least two weeks to complete it.
6. Instructors must keep class-by-class records of students’ contributions towards their participation mark that can be audited if needed. It is strongly recommended that records of contributions be completed right after each class.
7. All class records, including records of class participation, should be retained for a period of twelve months and destroyed thereafter.

8. The way in which course grades will be calculated should be clear to students from the start of the term:

   • As Schulich does not use a standardized percentage grading scale, percentage grades have no automatic letter grade equivalent. However, instructors that choose to use percentage marks must use a fixed translation of percentages to letter grades or index values and make clear the translation in the course outline at the start of the term. Translations commonly used at York University are shown below.
   • Students should be able to determine their letter grade or index value for each graded component of a course at the time the component is graded. If curving of grades is needed, it should take place at the time each component is graded, not at the time final grades are calculated. Students should be able, after each graded component is marked, to know their aggregate grade for the course at that time.
   • Final course grades should be the sum of all component grades multiplied by their respective weight.
   • The option to round grades is at the discretion of the instructor. If final grades are to be rounded, this should be stated in the course outline. A consistent rounding policy should be applied to all students in a course.  For example, if you notified students in advance using the course outline that you would be using rounding and you find that a few students’ final grades are sitting half a point below the higher grade category, you may opt to round those grades up. This policy should also support you in responding to individual students who may be contacting you with one-off requests for rounding up to help them meet the criteria for various competitive opportunities such as awards and internships. One-off requests cannot be granted because it leads to inequity between students, violates the School’s policy, and creates the grounds for grade appeals and grade distribution anomalies in courses.
   • Grade changes, beyond the rounding up or down of marks or the correction of errors, must be based on the assessment of the course deliverables as outlined in the course syllabus. Assignments given for the sole purpose of increasing marks are not permitted. Once a course is underway, instructors should not assign additional deliverables beyond those indicated in the course syllabus without the agreement of all students in the course. Any opportunities for students to gain additional course or assignment marks must be made available to all students in the course.
   • For core courses with multiple sections, grades should be calculated in the same manner.
   • Each component of the final grade should be reported separately to students (this includes class participation grades).
   • Sections of required core courses are normally expected to have a mean grade of between 4.70 and 6.10 grade points for Masters-level core courses, and between 5.20 and 6.20 grade points for Masters-level electives. For undergraduate courses, the average course grade awarded within a section should be between 5.50 and 7.00. Grade distributions that do not meet this policy must be reviewed by the Area Coordinator or appropriate Program/Specialization Director. The Course Director and the approver should be prepared to explain the basis for the grade distributions that do not meet this policy.
9. Instructors must adhere to the policies communicated in their course outline and at the start of their course.

Common Grading Scales at York

* The letter grade E is not used within the Schulich School of Business, although other York Faculties use it. A failing grade of ‘E’ obtained in a non-Schulich course will be recorded as such and calculated into the GPA using an index value of 1.

Below is an example of a masters-level grading system with percentage score translation.