This article provides an overview of the process of grading (marking) in Inspera. An overview of the Grader function, which includes an explanation of the different workspaces is available in this article – Introduction to Grade in Inspera. The article explaining the different ways that feedback can be provided in Inspera will also be helpful background reading.
This article will provide a brief introduction to the actions outlined below and provide links to support articles:
- Marking candidates (students).
- Providing general feedback to a student.
- Providing generic cohort feedback.
- Confirm marks for release to students.
- External Examiner access
- Allocating students to graders.
Marking candidates (students)
Marking (Grading) takes place in the Marking Workspace in ‘Grade’. When marking in this space it is possible to navigate on a single candidate, viewing all the questions. Alternatively, you can focus on one question at a time and move through the candidates.
When marking individual questions:
- Automatically marked questions are scored by Inspera but if adjustments are needed the scores for individual questions can be amended.
- Manually marked questions – how these are scored will depend on the set up of the question, whether maximum marks or a rubric has been used.
- Feedback can be provided by attaching annotations or page notes.
For an overview see – Guide – mark candidates
Providing general feedback to a student
General feedback, at the assessment level, can be provided to students using the Explanations workspace in Grade. This can be in form of written feedback, recorded audio or through file attachments.
Sending Explanations is a separate task to confirming grades. Explanations can be sent individually, this can be done at any point and does not need to wait until Grading is complete. Please note it is advised not to do this, grading should be completed first. To send Explanations to all students, Graders need to have marked Explanations as ‘Ready’ and confirmed Grades.
Providing generic cohort feedback
Generic cohort feedback can be provided using the Assessment Feedback workspace. This feedback is released to all students taking the assessment via the Candidate Report. If required, this feature must be enabled when scheduling the test (Assessment Feedback) and the Candidate Report must also be enabled.
It is only the Planner who can populate this feedback. The feedback can be provided by writing into the feedback field, recording audio or attaching files.
Confirm marks for release to students
It is recommended that when scheduling a test under Grading Workflow the option ‘One Grader can Confirm’ is selected. This will mean that once grading is complete and has been internally moderated one person (i.e. module lead) can Confirm the marks. This will then release the marks and candidate report (if enabled) to the students.
If the option ‘All Graders must Confirm’ has been selected when scheduling the test then before marks can be released to students it is necessary for all Graders allocated to the test to select the Confirm button before the marks can be released to students.
Using Grade Scales – if when scheduling the test the option to use ‘Grade Scales’ was selected under ‘Assessment Settings’ then to ensure the students receive the grade rather than the marks from the test then in the ‘Candidate in Focus’ workspace choose ‘Use Calculated’ from the Grade drop down menu.
External Examiner access
External Examiner’s are not currently provided with access to Inspera, this will be enabled once ‘view only’ access becomes available during 2025. To provide visibility to external examiners for pre-moderation and pots-moderation the following actions can be taken:
- Pre-moderation – your Question Set can be downloaded, with correct answers (for most automatically marked questions). To download, when viewing your Question Set, select the printer icon and then under Settings select to include correct answers if needed; and then select download.
- Post-moderation – two separate files will need to be downloaded to show both student work and the feedback provided. Student submissions can be downloaded via the Grade module. Feedback provided requires the Candidate Report to be downloaded, this is also via the Grade module.
- Downloading student submissions – individual student submissions can be downloaded by clicking on the ‘…’ symbol when in the Marking workspace in Grade. All student submissions can be downloaded from the ‘options’ menu in Grade.
- Downloading Candidate Report – these can be printed (and saved as a pdf) by clicking on the ‘Print’ button when viewing Candidate Reports in Grade. These will need to be printed separately for each student.
Allocating students to graders
It is possible in Inspera to allocate groups of students to one or more graders. This will be potentially beneficial for large modules and does mean that those graders will only see the students (candidates) they have been allocated.
Committees need to be created when scheduling a test. See Test Settings – Committees.
