How to guide: marks transfer

A new Moodle-Portico marks transfer integration has been designed and developed to improve the process for transferring marks from Moodle to Portico. Guidance on how to use this tool is broken down into key sections below.

Accessing the tool

Firstly, to access the Marks Transfer Wizard (the main dashboard for transferring marks for summative assessments in Moodle), log into your Moodle course and go to the main course tabs then click More and choose SITS Marks Transfer.


Screenshot showing how to access Moodle SITS Marks Transfer Wizard 


Once you have clicked the SITS Marks Transfer link, you will be taken to a marks transfer wizard which will display a module delivery table (or tables) with an overview of all Portico assessment components that have been associated with that module delivery. This will include components that have been mapped to your Moodle course and any assessment components which are not expected to take place in Moodle. 


Screen shot of a module delivery table with an assessment component outside of Moodle an assessment component in Moodle.


It is possible to jump to a specific module delivery table on the page using the drop-down menu in the top left.  Each table in the marks transfer wizard will have a heading displaying the module delivery details, level and map code. Beneath that you will see the Portico assessment sequence number, assessment component name and weight. The marks transfer wizard will include details of Moodle activities that have been linked (or "mapped") to those assessment components.  You will also be able to "map" any unlinked assessment components to a source Moodle activity which you intend to transfer the marks from. Finally, in the "Marks to transfer" column you will see the number of marks that are available to transfer from the linked Moodle activity, and if you click the link this will take you to a status page which will display more details.


Screen shot of an example module delivery table in the marks transfer wizard.

Transferring marks from one Moodle activity to one assessment component in Portico

Currently, you can transfer the marks from one single Moodle Assignment, Moodle Quiz or Turnitin Assignment to one or multiple assessment components in Portico.

Initial set-up

Before you can transfer marks from Moodle to Portico, you need to "map" a Portico assessment component to a source Moodle activity. To do this, simply go to the row with the Portico assessment you wish to transfer marks to and in the Moodle activity column, click Select source.


Screen shot of select source for an example module delivery table in the marks transfer wizard.


You will be taken to the Select Existing Activity page. Please click the blue + Select button next to the relevant Moodle assessment activity. 

Screen shot of Select Existing Activity Page


You will be asked to confirm that you wish to return marks from the Moodle assessment activity you have selected to the MAB and related Sequence Number in Portico. If you are sure you want to go ahead, click Confirm.


Screen shot of Confirmation modal after selecting source Moodle activity.

Mark transfer actions

After you have mapped a SITS assessment component to a source Moodle activity in the Marks Transfer Wizard, there are two main actions you can complete. 

a. Change the source Moodle activity

You can change the source Moodle activity you have mapped the SITS assessment component to. Please note you can only do this before you have transferred the marks.

To do this, click Change source beneath the relevant Moodle activity. This will take you through the same steps as when you first mapped to an assessment activity in the initial set-up.


Screen shot of Change source link in the Marks Transfer Wizard.

b. Transfer the marks

If you have marks to transfer, click the Transfer marks button in the Marks to transfer column. The marks that will be transferred will be the marks that are in the Moodle Grade Book for the relevant Moodle assessment activity. Please remember you can only transfer the available marks once. Marks that have been transferred to Portico cannot be overwritten from Moodle and any changes or penalties will need to be made directly in Portico.


Screen shot of Transfer marks button in Marks Transfer Wizard.


Once you have clicked the Transfer marks button, a warning box will appear. You will be asked to click the blue Confirm button to confirm you are sure you wish to transfer the marks. Please ensure you have got everything correct before you confirm, as this action cannot be reversed! 


Screenshot of marks transfer warning box


After confirming, you will see "Marks transfer in progress" as well as a progress bar, showing the proportion of records that have been transferred so far. If there are many records to transfer, this may take some time. However, you will receive an email notifying you when the job is complete with a link to the SITS Marks Transfer Status page. Progress bars will also appear in the Marks Transfer Status page while marks transfer is still in progress.


Screen shot of wizard when marks transfer is in progress.

c. View marks transfer status

To view the status for a Mark Transfer, you would need to click the link showing the number of marks in the Marks to transfer column (or the Marks transfer in progress link).


Screen shot of link in marks to transfer column to view details in status page.


This will take you to the SITS Marks Transfer Status page.  This page will display details on each student (name and Portico number), their mark, submission date and time, whether each mark transfer was successful or not and the last date and time their mark was transferred. 


Screen shot of the marks transfer status page.

Transferring marks from one Moodle activity to more than one assessment component in Portico

As mentioned earlier, in this version of the tool, you can transfer the marks from one single Moodle Assignment, Moodle Quiz or Turnitin Assignment to one or multiple assessment components in Portico. The process only differs slightly when your Moodle course is mapped to more than one module delivery.

Initial set-up

When there is more than one module delivery, the marks transfer wizard will display a table for each module delivery with an oveview of all the assessment components in Portico. As before, you will be able to link each assessment component to a source Moodle activity that you intend to transfer the marks from (see the method above). However, when the Moodle course is mapped to more than one module delivery, the same Moodle activity can be mapped to an assessment component for each module delivery. In other words, the marks for one Moodle activity can be transferred to more than one module delivery in Portico. 


Mark transfer actions

The actions for changing the source Moodle activity, transferring the marks or viewing the transfer records are exactly the same as they are for transferring marks to one Portico assessment component. However, if you prefer, you can do the initial set-up for all module deliveries and then transfer the marks for all by clicking the Transfer all button at the bottom of the page.


Video how to guides

  1. How to access the Marks Transfer Wizard
  2. Introduction to the Marks Transfer Wizard
  3. Initial set up in the Marks Transfer Wizard
  4. Changing the source Moodle activity
  5. Transferring the marks
  6. Viewing the status page