Upload and Manage Gradescope Bubble Sheet Scans

Summary: Instructors can upload scanned Gradescope bubble sheets as PDFs and automatically separate them into individual student submissions. The Manage Scans page also provides tools to review submissions and correct page orientation before grading.

Quick Links: | Prerequisites | Instructions | Troubleshooting |

Introduction

Gradescope allows instructors to upload scanned bubble sheets and automatically organize them into individual student submissions. Instructors can upload a PDF containing multiple completed bubble sheets instead of processing each submission separately. Gradescope can automatically split these scans into submissions, and instructors can review and correct page orientation before continuing with grading. The Manage Scans workflow is available only for instructor-uploaded assignments.

Prerequisites

• An existing instructor-uploaded bubble sheet assignment in Gradescope.
• Completed bubble sheets scanned and saved as PDF files.
• Access to the assignment's Manage Scans page.
• Scans that follow Gradescope's recommended scanning practices.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Upload and Process Bubble Sheet Scans

Upload Scanned Bubble Sheets

To upload completed bubble sheets to Gradescope, do the following:

1. Open your instructor-uploaded bubble sheet assignment in Gradescope.
2. Navigate to Manage Scans.
3. Select Select PDF Files.
4. Choose the scanned PDF files from your device. Gradescope will begin uploading them automatically.
5. Allow Gradescope to process the uploaded scans.

You can also drag and drop PDF files directly onto the Manage Scans page.

For faster processing, upload PDFs containing multiple student submissions rather than uploading a separate PDF for each student.

Review Automatically Created Submissions

To verify that Gradescope correctly separated your scans, do the following:

1. On the Manage Scans page, locate the uploaded PDF.
2. Look for the message indicating that submissions were created automatically.
3. Select Show to expand the uploaded file.
4. Review the individual submissions to confirm that Gradescope separated the pages correctly.

Gradescope will organize the scanned bubble sheets into individual submissions when it can confidently identify the page boundaries.

If Gradescope cannot automatically separate the scans, see the troubleshooting section below.

Rotate Scanned Submissions

To rotate an individual submission, do the following:

1. Open Manage Scans.
2. If Gradescope automatically split the uploaded PDF, select Undo Automatic Split at the bottom of the page to enable page adjustments.
3. Find the submission that needs rotation.
4. Select Rotate Submission to the right of the submission.
5. Repeat until the submission is oriented correctly.
6. If submissions have not yet been created, select Create Submissions after completing your adjustments.

To rotate every page in an uploaded PDF, select Rotate PDF at the bottom of the Manage Scans page instead of rotating submissions individually.

Your scanned bubble sheets should now be uploaded, correctly oriented, and organized into student submissions for grading.

Troubleshooting

If Gradescope displays "Ready to Create Submissions (Unable to confidently auto-split)," it could not determine how to divide the PDF into individual submissions. See the related article, "Fix Gradescope Bubble Sheet Auto-Split Errors," for instructions on manually organizing the scans.

If the Manage Scans page is missing, verify that the assignment uses the instructor-uploaded workflow. Student-uploaded assignments do not include this page.

For additional guidance, see Managing Scans for Bubble Sheet Assignments – Gradescope Guides.