Online Grading System

The Development of an Online Grading System by Mary Jane Santos Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of BS Information Technology Integrated College of Business and Technology December 2010 CHAPTER 1 The Problem and Its Background Introduction In essence, grading is an exercise in professional judgment on the part of instructors. It involves the collection and evaluation of evidence on students’ achievement or performance over a specified period of time, such as nine weeks, an academic semester, or entire school year.

Through this process, various types of descriptive information and measures of students’ performance are converted into grades or marks that summarize students’ accomplishments. The increasing usage of computers in the mid and late 90’s gave way for the birth of a new technological advancement that had assisted teachers and professors to easily compute for grades, the digitization of spreadsheets. The main advantage is speed, since no manual calculations are needed, and confirmation of grade for any further necessary alterations can also be performed more quickly than traditional means.

Managing grades had become easier for instructors when using electronic spreadsheets. With the advancement of information technology at the turn of the millennium, the Internet suddenly became an important aspect for local and global connectivity. Because the world’s PCs were logically connected through the Internet medium, communication had been easier with the use of E-Mail, ICQ, message boards and other communication programs. As the technology’s complexities and bandwidth arise, so does the need for software to utilize them.

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From basic text and images, innovation pushed web sites to include tools for specialized services.

The need to inject applications to the fundamental web pages gave birth to server-side scripts like PHP, and database applications like MySQL. In turn, specialized online systems for different areas like education and commerce were developed using these tools. Significance of the Study Institutions like universities and colleges often have complex and lengthy computations when it comes to final grading since computations of grades which includes a number of quizzes, assignments, seat works, projects, major examinations and other curricular activities.

Traditionally, this was done manually with pen and paper and is usually paired up with high queues of record books. An old manual system of grading or computations can take 3 to 5 minutes per student record to fully transpire and a procedure this tedious is a burden to anyone in the present fast paced and demanding profession. The primary objective of this study is to develop a secured online grading management system for professors, instructors and students..

This study will reduce and eliminate the amount of time required by the instructor to personally provide necessary feedback to the students and at the same time to make available a means by which students can easily verify that each of their score have been recorded. Another is that, it will provide a spreadsheet-like environment and adequate tools so instructors can customize a grading outline according to their preferences. Lastly, the study will automate an archival process in which it is initialized after finalizing the student’s grade.

Like many of today’s applications, there are always positive effects or contributions to different types of users and institutions. This online application will benefit the professors because it will render the need of using external spreadsheet software unnecessary. This application will also reduce the time and effort needed in accomplishing final grade reports. In addition this will benefit the students because they can view the grading process of their performance. The school will also benefit on the long run because lesser time would be consumed in providing grade reports.

This had also become beneficial to the student’s parents because it has lessen and somewhat eliminate the hassle of verifying the grades of their sons and daughters. Conceptual Framework Linear System theory is the foundation of the basic analysis of this system. Linear system theory assumes a cause-and-effect relationship for the components of a system. The input and output relationship represents processing the cause-and-effect of the process, which in turn represents a processing of the input variables to provide an output variable.

The paradigm of the study consists of the context as shown in Figure 1. INPUT PROCESS OUTPUT The context is composed of the existing system in the manner of computing grades which are either manually or computerized by using spreadsheets. Moreover, it also includes the sources of data which are the reading materials like magazines, books, internet and by observing and asking qualified respondents that could give clarity to the study.

The process of developing an online grade management system consists of creating a system flow chart that will serve as a guide in the creation of the program/system, the ERD (Entity-Relationship Diagram) that will be essential for the database or record keeping of the system and encoding, debugging errors and execution of the program. Statement of the Problem The general problem of the study is how to develop an online management system. There are some specific problem in this study that needs to be solved to accomplish the project. They are the following: 1.

What programming language and web development tool to use to develop the system? 2. What will be the best web design? 3. What features should be included in the system? 4. How to ensure the security and integrity of the system? 5. How will the data be gathered and inputted into the system? Definition of Terms The following are the words used operationally in the study:
• Online. Refers to a state of having an internet access or being connected to the wide area network.
• Grade Management. Is a process of collecting, computing, handling and maintaining records of grades.

Scope and Delimitations The focus of this study will cover the aspects of a grading system. It will not delve on securing the components from medium and high level attacks. The application will allow the users to add and modify computations using the basic arithmetic operations and logical statements (MS Excel’s VLOOKUP function). Additionally, the capacity of the data store or the maximum size is to be specified by the administrator. The automated archival process had initiate after subjecting the grades into finalization. CHAPTER 2

Review of Related Literature Online Grade Management Alvin Phililp C. Prina alvinprina@gmail. com March 15, 2009 The methodology Rapid Application Development refers to a development cycle designed to give faster development and higher quality systems than the traditional one (SDLC). It is designed to take advantage of powerful tools like prototyping, iterative customization, code generators and CASE. The key objectives of RAD are high speed, high quality and low cost which are appropriate for the proponents’ team of three.

This developmental methodology was selected because of it’s iterative nature to produce the needed requirements which was more than applicable to an online application. Additionally, the active user involvement in iterative development helped the developers to improve upon their work by constantly providing feedback. The RAD life cycle consists of four stages, namely, requirements planning, user design, rapid construction, and the transition stage. GRADING SYSTEMS, Thomas R. Guskey and Howard R. Pollio Encyclopedia of Education 2002

This article states that grading is an exercise in professional judgment on the part of teachers. It involves the collection and evaluation of evidence on students’ achievement or performance over a specified period of time, such as nine weeks, an academic semester, or entire school year. Through this process, various types of descriptive information and measures of students’ performance are converted into grades or marks that summarize students’ accomplishments. Although some educators distinguish between grades and marks, most consider these terms synonymous.

Both imply a set of symbols, words, or numbers that are used to designate different levels of achievement or performance. They might be letter grades such as A, B, C, D, and F; symbols such as ? +, ? , and ?? ; descriptive words such as Exemplary, Satisfactory, and Needs Improvement; or numerals such as 4, 3, 2, and 1. Reporting is the process by which these judgments are communicated to parents, students, or others. The issues of grading and reporting on student learning continue to challenge educators.

However, more is known at the beginning of the twenty-first century than ever before about the complexities involved and how certain practices can influence teaching and learning. To develop grading and reporting practices that provide quality information about student learning requires clear thinking, careful planning, excellent communication skills, and an overriding concern for the well-being of students. Combining these skills with current knowledge on effective practice will surely result in more efficient and more effective grading and reporting practices.

ONLINE GRADING SYSTEM www. gradesense. net Teachers all over the nation have discovered that when they utilize an online grading system, they are able to quickly and easy update, track, and grade student performance in much less time than they ever thought possible. Parents and students also enjoy being able to take part in an online grading system. This is because students and parents can access an online grading system with a password and can track grades and assignments whenever they need to.

This helps students become more aware of their grades and also helps parents get involved in their child’s schooling. And as any teacher will tell you, when parents and teachers can work together to help a child succeed, that child has a much better chance of getting the most out of his or her schooling. The other great thing about an online grading system is that it can also be used to create report cards, assignment reports, class grade lists, student GPA, seating charts, roll sheets, attendance reports, and more.

Online Grading Systems Mean No More Changing D’s to B’s Daniel de Vise Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, November 3, 2008 The proliferation of online grading systems has transformed relations among teachers, parents and students and changed the rhythm of the school year. Internet-based programs including SchoolMAX and Edulink are pushing midterm progress reports into obsolescence. Prospective failure is no longer a bombshell dropped in a parent-teacher conference. A bad grade on a test can’t be concealed by discarding the evidence.

A student can log on at school, or a parent at work, to see the immediate impact of a missed assignment on the cumulative grade or to calculate what score on the next quiz might raise an 89. 5 to a 90. Report cards hold little surprise. Parents say the programs reconnect them to the academic lives of their children, a relationship that can decay as students move from elementary to middle and high school. Such knowledge can also feed the controlling tendencies of the helicopter parent.

Young receives an e-mail alert each time a grade is posted in any of her daughter’s classes, which is almost every day. “You can get a little obsessive about it,” she said. In the past year or two, the wave of Internet-based classroom “portals” has given parents and students the ability to review grades, download homework assignments and chat with teachers online. Such programs are increasingly common across the nation, a fringe benefit of the move toward centralized databases of grades, test scores and other education minutiae.

School systems have fresh interest in such data because of the federal No Child Left Behind law, which requires them to report statistics on performance, attendance and discipline. The success of such programs depends on their security. Charles County schools posted grades online last school year but took them down this fall after the program accidentally gave some parents access to the grades of other people’s children. The school system is searching for a new program because parents miss their daily fix. Online Grading Systems

Diane Sievert To begin with, software has to be installed on a computer as an application; in other words, to use the grading software, you must be using a computer on which that software has been installed. On the other hand, online grading systems can be employed from any computer that has internet access. That means you can work on your grades from home or in the classroom without having to lug a laptop back and forth. Another benefit of working with online grading systems is that you can post student grades online.

Students are then given a log-in ID and a password so that they can check their academic progress whenever they feel like it. Gone are the days that students could complain and claim they had no idea they were doing poorly–posting grades online means that staying informed of their scholastic situation is the student’s responsibility. The same idea goes for parents as well. All too often parents feel like they’re left in the dark when it comes to their child’s academic situation–the occasional progress report isn’t always enough to get them up-to-date.

If parents can access their child’s grades online, they can nip minor problems in the bud and keep said problems from blooming into a scholastic catastrophe. Illinois Virtual High School Inquiry http://www. ivhs. org/ This online inquiry gives detailed information on persons that can be contacted with regard to specific field; example is a general program Issues, Technical Problems, Faculty Information and course development. It also gives information about their regional coordinators for participating schools. The website has a login feature where the students can login using their login ID.

The online inquiry system of Illinois High School helps the authors to picture out and develop an ideal database structure for the system that will be proposed. The proponents system is similar and is based on some capabilities of the system in this study like the inquiry of courses and login feature for the students. ———————– Manual / computerized computation of grades
• Internet
• Books
• Magazines
• Interviews Development of an Online Grade Management System for Baliwag Polytechnic College
• Creating a flowchart and ERD (Entity Relationship Diagram)
• Encoding
• Debugging
• Executing