Gradebook Passback is available for districts who utilize Skyward as their Student Information System to transfer points-based assessments and scores nightly from Otus to Skyward. The following sections outline the steps necessary to successfully use Gradebook Passback.
❓ Are you an administrator interested in setting up this feature for your team? Check out our Skyward Gradebook Passback Guide for Admins.
Ensure Membership in the Skyward Gradebook Passback Group
Ensure that you are a member of the Skyward Gradebook Passback teacher group in Otus. If you are not already a member of that group, please contact your district's Otus Admin or Main Admin to request to be added to the group.
💡 Tip: In order for grades to pass back to your SIS, the user who has assigned the assessment must be included in the Skyward Gradebook Passback teacher group. We recommend that any teacher, co-teacher, or administrator who may be assigning assessments are added to the Skyward Gradebook Passback teacher group in Otus.
Assessments assigned directly to a class from an Otus Administrator (who is not in your SIS) will not passback to the gradebook. This assessment should be assigned to the class by the teacher or co-teacher who are a member of the Skyward Gradebook Passback teacher group.
When a teacher joins a passback group all of their assessments eligible for passback will passback retroactively to the Effective Date. However, Skyward prevents assessments from passing back to a closed grading period so grades will not pass back for prior grading periods even if the Effective Date goes back that far.
Create a Points-Based Assessment
Create an Otus assessment using a Points Grading Scale. Only assessments created using a Points Grading Scale will passback. If you select a Standards Based Grading Scale for your assessment, the data will not passback to Skyward. The image below illustrates how to select the correct Grading Scale when creating your assessment.
💡 Tip: The selected Assessment Type in Otus will be sent to a specific category in Skyward that has been defined by your administrators. Teachers can change the category in Skyward once the grade has been sent.
Assign the Assessment
Specify a Due Date when assigning the assessment, as Skyward requires a Due Date for the scores to transfer. If you do not specify a Due Date, the Due Date sent to Skyward will be calculated during the sync process by adding 7 days to the assessment creation or assigning date.
❗️ IMPORTANT NOTE: Assignments with Due Dates outside of the current grading period will not pass back. Please keep this in mind when approaching the end of a grading period.
Select “Include Score in Final Grade” for the scores to passback to Skyward. If the box below is not checked, the score will not passback to Skyward.
Plus (+) Assessments
When adding plus (+) assessments to the Otus gradebook, please note these slight differences from other types of assessments:
The "Include Score in Final Grade" is a toggle that must be toggled ON for the scores to passback.
Add a Due Date in the appropriate field. If a due date is not specified, Otus will calculate the due date by adding 7 days to the Submission Date.
Grade the Assessment
After the assessment is submitted by a student, questions that were set to auto-score will already have grades, but be sure to grade any ungraded items so that the assessment has a status of “Graded” in Otus. If you see a status of “Turned In,” that assessment score will not pass back until all ungraded items are graded.
After all items in your assessment are graded, you can expect scores to pass back with the nightly sync which means the scores will be visible in Skyward the following day.
Otus scores will not passback to a closed Skyward grading period. Make sure your Otus assessments are graded before the close of a grading period for your scores to pass back.
An asterisk (*) will be present in Skyward in place of a student’s score if any of these situations are true:
The student did not complete the assignment and therefore Otus has no score to pass back.
The assignment was not assigned to that student but was assigned to another student in the same class/gradebook (linked Skyward gradebooks).
The score did not post successfully to Skyward via the passback process.
If the student did not complete the assignment and you wish to eliminate the '*' from the Skyward gradebook, you may grade the assessment in Otus (including entering a 0 in Otus) or enter a 0 score in Skyward.
Additional Considerations
The status of the assignment (e.g., Excluded, Excused, Missing, etc.) will not pass back to Skyward. The assignment status will have to be manually adjusted in Skyward.
Any weighting of scores needs to be done in Skyward; weighting in Otus does not pass back.
Assessments with decimal total score (e.g., 27.5 points) will not pass back.
Certain adjustments to your assessment in Otus will cause the assessment score to resend to Skyward. Examples include:
If you edit the Assessment Title, Otus re-sends the score to Skyward.
If you edit the Assessment Type, Otus re-sends the score to Skyward.
If you edit a score in Otus, Otus re-sends the new score to Skyward.
If you adjust assessment settings to "Include Score in Final Grade" after it has been assigned, scores will be sent to Skyward after the sync.
If you edit a score in Skyward but not in Otus, Otus will not overwrite the score in Skyward.
If the due date has passed and the student has not submitted the assessment, it will pass back to Skyward with a score of 0 (zero).
Accessing the Skyward API Log
Click to view a video tutorial on how to check grade pass back details from Otus to Skyward using the Skyward API log.
Click to view a video tutorial on how to check grade pass back details from Otus to Skyward using the Skyward API log.