Many assessment systems have grown ‘like topsy’ over the years, often containing thousands and thousands of marksheets that can make finding the right marksheet very difficult. Here’s how to set up your marksheets for the new academic year so that your teachers just see most recent marksheets.
You’ll find that marksheets based on whole year groups work fine at the start of the new academic year. That’s because SIMS promotes pupils from one year to the next as part of the end of year routines.
But registration groups and teaching classes are different: they are usually re-created new each year. So last year’s marksheet no longer show any pupils after the start of the new academic year and you need to delete them are create the new marksheets for the new year. In this post, I’ll show you how…
Identify the template behind the marksheet
Marksheets names are made up of two elements separated by a colon. The part before the colon refers to the underlying template from which the marksheet is derived and the part after the colon refers to the group of pupils it represents.
For example a marksheet called KS2 Maths Y6: 6R is based on a template called KS2 Maths Y6 and is populated by pupils in a reg group called 6R. A marksheet called Year 11 English : 7x/Sc1 is based on a template called Year 11 English and a teaching class called 7x/Sc1
Open the template and delete the old marksheets
- To the template go to Focus | Assessment | Templates and locate your template
- Go to section 3 ‘marksheets’
- Each marksheet is identified by the group of pupils that it contains.
- Highlight the marksheet to be deleted and click the red cross to the right hand side of the marksheets box.
- Repeat as necessary. You can use shift and click to select multiple marksheets
Create the new marksheets
- Open the templates as above.
- In section 3 ‘marksheets’ click on the new button and choose the relevant registration group, teaching class or year group.
- When you create a marksheet, SIMS will take care of granting access to the right people. So the member of staff who teaches the class will get automatic access to any marksheets based on the class. The heads of year will get access to the marksheets based on courses, and the heads of year get access to marksheets based on year groups.
Alternatively, delete the lot and start again
This may sound like drastic advice, but when it comes to marksheets it makes sense. Many systems contain legacy marksheets that a) no-one remembers what they are for or b) don’t contain any pupils. You can bulk delete marksheets using Tools | Performance | Assessment | System Utilities.
Finally, don’t be scared…
If you delete a marksheet you do not delete any results. The pupil’s results remain in SIMS. If you ever delete a marksheet in error you can always recreate it from the template.
No results are harmed when you delete a marksheet!
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Can ypu set up new marksheets first then delete old ones
Hi Lynda, yes you can – although marksheets based on teaching classes often need to be be created at the start of the new academic year.
This is really useful David, however the marksheets seem to have been set up correctly, but there are no students displayed. I checked course manager and the classes and students are present. What have I done wrong?
When you choose the classes, check the group membership date above. Usually these two dates should reflect the current academic year, but sometimes they get stuck on the previous year.