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Who can use this?

  • Who: Teachers and co-teachers
  • Plans: All plans
  • Where: The bar at the top of an assignment, and Settings > Danger zone

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Limits and notes

  • This page is for assignments students submit to. An assignment where you upload the work has no open or close; it shows a Teacher-only chip and nothing else.
  • A due date passing does not close an assignment. Only Close for submissions does.
  • Closing in GradingPal does not close the assignment in Google Classroom.
  • Times are read in the class’s time zone, shown beside every date.

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Go live

A new assignment students submit to starts as Draft: “Hidden from students — open it so they can submit”. Going live is one action, not two.
  • For a class collecting in GradingPal, select Open for submissions. The toast reads Assignment is open — students can submit with the join link.
  • For a Google Classroom class, select Post to Google Classroom. The toast reads Posted to Google Classroom — students can now submit there. Posting creates the assignment in Classroom; there’s no separate sync step.
The pill changes to Live, and the bar starts counting submissions.

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Schedule an opening time

1

Select Schedule

In the bar, select Schedule. The dialog says when it will open, or post to Classroom, and that until then it stays a draft.
2

Pick the time

Fill in Opens on (or Posts on). The note under it names the class time zone.
3

Confirm

Select Schedule. The pill changes to Scheduled and the bar reads Opens to students followed by the time.
To change it, select Edit schedule and Update, or Remove schedule to go back to a draft. Open now or Post now skips the wait.

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Close and re-open

Open the menu beside the main button and select Close for submissions, or use the same row under Settings > Danger zone. The confirmation says nothing is lost and you can re-open any time. The pill changes to Closed and the bar reads Closed with the date and “no new submissions”. For a Classroom assignment the confirmation adds: “The assignment stays open in Google Classroom, so students can still turn in — but GradingPal stops collecting and grading.” Anything that arrives afterwards comes in with Import from Classroom. Re-open in the bar, or Re-open for submissions in the menu, puts it back to Live. Grades and feedback stay as they are.

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How to tell it worked

The pill and the bar hint match what you did: Draft and hidden, Scheduled with a time, Live with a count, or Closed with a date. The class’s Assignments list shows the same pill.

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If something goes wrong

The tooltip says Finish setting up the questions first. A question-based assignment can’t open until its questions and answer keys are approved.
Students can submit in GradingPal but Classroom wasn’t posted. Retry from Post to Google Classroom under Settings > Distribution, or reconnect your Google account first.
Check the pill. Draft and Scheduled are hidden from students. For a Classroom class, check Settings > Distribution reads Connected — syncing, not Not posted yet.
Opens GradingPal on the screen this page describes.

Last updated 19 September 2026

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