How does the setting "Number of scores to ignore for each student" in Assignment Groups treat a student with only one grade?

Question

I have two related scenarios I'm trying to cater for:

* All students are graded for Assignment 1. Only if a student fails do they do Assignment 2. The assignments are in the same Assignment Group (AG) because I only want one final grade (the highest) for each student. I set the AG to drop the lowest score. This works for students who have attempted both assignments BUT the students who pass Assignment 1 don't do Assignment 2 so if the AG is set to drop their lowest it will drop their Assignment 1 grade, which isn't desirable. I suspect Canvas overrides the rule for those students and gives them their Assignment 1 grade. Or do I need to make Assignment 2 automatically give a zero to students who didn't attempt it?
* This is the same scenario as above except that there is now an Assignment 3 for those who failed both Assignment 1 and 2. Again, I only want the highest score. As I understand it, I would need to change the AG settings to drop the lowest 2 scores. I can see how students who had a failed score for Assignments 1 & 2 but a pass for Assignment 3 would get the Assignment 3 score. But would Assignment 1 students who hadn't done Assignments 1&2, and Assignment 2 students who hadn't done Assignment 3, get the right scores?

I'm thinking that the solution might be to set the default grade for Assignment 2 & 3 to zero.

A better solution, which I've submitted as a feature request, is to allow us to take the highest grade (rather than drop the lowest).

stimme · Accepted Answer

For both scenarios you describe, students need grades on all of the assignments in the group in order for the AG subtotal to be calculated and figure into the total grade for the course. That's because the number of dropped assignments is one less than the total number of assignments in the group. Setting zeroes for the assignments the students do not do because they do not have to do them is a good solution. Using the Set Default Grade option is a quick way to do give them the zeroes they need (just be sure not to overwrite existing grades).