Grade Tracker
Written by Chris Osborne
Contents
I - Legal
II - Version Changes
III - Class Grade Sheet
IV - GPA Sheets
V - Ideas for the Future
VI - Thanks
I - Legal
     Grade Tracker is released under a Creative Commons Attribution/Non-Commercial license.  It is free for personal use.  For commercial use, please make a donation (PayPal donation button can be found at http://jugglechainsaws.com).
     This was originally written for my personal use, and expanded so that some of my friends could also use it.  For this reason, I make no guarantee that it will work for you.  However, I will try to help you with any problems that may arise.
    However, I will not put individual information into the spreadsheet for you unless you make a donation of at least 10 USD.  You would also have to provide me with all of the information so that it would be correct.  
II - Version Changes
     v1.0 - Tracks grades inside class, tracks GPA (initial release)
    v1.5 - Calculates max grade possible in a class (discarding future extra credit), calculates number of points needed to reach each grade level
III - Class Grade Sheet
     Most thingsshould be pretty self explainitory here.  But just in case, here is how everything works.
  1. The 'Task' column is for the name of each task in a class.  These names are for labeling purposes only and do not effect anything else.
  2. The 'Earned' column is for the number of points that you earned on an assignment.  This will need to be manually put in by you as you earn grades.
  3. The 'Possible' column is for the total number of points that you can earn on an assignment.  Please note that extra credit on an assignment should not be considered when putting in the possible points, because if you treat those as points you can earn Grade Tracker will not count those points as extra credit.
  4. The 'Extra Credit' row in the assignments table is entirely optional.  Grade Tracker will count extra credit points the same no matter if they appear in this row or added in with the points earned on an assignment.
  5. The 'Points Lost' column automatically prints the number of points lost on an assignment.  Negative points mean that you earned more than 100% of the points possible (essentially extra credit).
  6. The cells in the 'Total' row all consist of SUM formulas that add up the column above that cell.
  7. The 'Grade' cell is the grade that you would recieve if earned zero (0) points for the rest of the class.
  8. The 'Max Grade' cell is the grade that you would recieve if you earned all of the points possible for the rest of the class.
  9. The grade scale at the bottom of each class shows the number of points needed to reach each grade level.  You will have to figure out the number of points needed for each level.  However, more than 95% of my college professors provide this information on the syllabus.  Put a zero (0) in for any grade level that is not possible (such as if a class does not have plus (+) or minus (-) grades), and a NA will be printed.  Negative numbers for the number of points needed indicate that you have already reached that grade level.
IV - GPA Sheets
  1. The Grade Scale in columns I and J should be pretty standard, but if your school uses a different scale then change it on the GPA sheet (this will automatically change the values on the same table on the Psych Grades sheet).
  2. The 'Class' column is only or labeling purposes.  I put the Course Code in, but you are perfectly welcome to use an label for the class that you wish.
  3. The 'Grade' column is for the letter grade that you recieved in a class.  I have had mixed results using lower case letters, so upper case is recommended. 
  4. The 'Hours' column is for how many hours a class is worth.
  5. The 'Credit Earned' column automatically calculates the credit earned based on the grade and hours that you entered in the 'Hours' and 'Grade' columns.  It uses a formula that consists of about 15 nested IF statements, so you probably don't want to mess with it.
  6. The 'Hours Earned/Credit Earned/GPA' box to the right of each semester shows only the information for that semester.  For an overall 'Hours Earned/Credit Earned/GPA,' use the box undeneath the Grade Scale box.
  7. The range for the overall 'Hours Earned/Credit Earned/GPA' box may need o be changed.  By default, it only accounts for the classes that I have a grade and hours for.
  8. The 'Psych Grades' sheet works exactly the same way, except it's major specific.
V - Ideas for the Future
  1. Get rid of the 'Points Lost' column.  I think it's a bit depressing to see how many points you've lost on each individual assignment.  But I was going for function over form, and it is the linchpin to the 'Max Grade' cell.
  2. Check to see if blanks in the 'Points Earned' column breaks things.  It works perfectly here, but online office suits are pretty forgiving. 
  3. Get rid of negatve point values in the 'Points Needed' section.  It's highly unlikely that you'll be able to lose points, and even if you do they would most ikely come off of a specific assignment.  I'm thinking a checkmark graphic or some other sort of visual indication of sucessfully reaching each grade level.
  4. Make the whole thing a stand alone program.  Mostly because I just think that it would be cooler and as a challenge to myself.
VI - Thanks
     There are three main people I would like to thank.
     Firstly my girlfriend, for helping me think of what this thing should do and for better ways to implement everything.  She is also the main Excel tester.
     Secondly, my roommate and his girlfriend.  They have continually offered general critiques and suggestions.