Dropping the Lowest Grade in the Gradebook

By Landon Phillips

Gradebook In-Depth: Drop Lowest

A professor recently asked how to drop the lowest score out of a series of quizzes. The process is quite easy and we can accomplish this in the Gradebook tool.

1. Go to the course.
2. Click Gradebook in the left menu.
3. Click Gradebook Setup in the gray toolbar.
4. Under "Categories & Weighting," select either "Categories Only" or "Categories & Weighting."
5. Enter the desired categories for your grades. To add more categories, click "Add a Category." In the example below, we've added five categories and numbered them so they display in a specific order.
6. Select "Enable Drop Lowest."
7. In the "Drop Lowest" column, enter the number of items you wish to drop automatically from the calculation (e.g. 1).
8. Click Save Changes.

NOTE: Each Gradebook item in the category must have the same points possible. For example, the professor has 10 quizzes and they are all worth a maximum of 10 points each.