Instructor Repository Delivery

Automatically stores a private, instructor-only copy of every assessment — including both questions and answers — in a dedicated repository. Students only ever see their student-facing report; the instructor copy is written separately using a PAT that students cannot access.

:::info Classroom 50 assignment repositories only Instructor repository delivery works only in the student repositories Classroom 50 creates when a student accepts an assignment, because the action identifies the assignment and the student from Classroom 50's repository naming. It is not available for any other repository — setting instructor_repo_token there only produces a warning. :::

How it works

When instructor_repo_token is provided the action:

1. Identifies the assignment and the student from the Classroom 50 repository name (<classroom>-<assignment>-<username>) and the repository's direct collaborators — see how the assignment and student are identified. A repository that doesn't follow that naming skips instructor delivery with a warning.
2. Derives the instructor repository name as {assignment-name}-grillmycode-instructor in the same organisation.
3. Creates the repository as private on first run if it does not already exist, commits a generate-lms-quiz.yml GitHub Actions workflow into it, and writes a descriptive README.md explaining the repository structure and contents. On every later run it re-checks both files and rewrites either one whose contents no longer match the copies shipped with the action, so a repository created by an older release picks up quiz-generation fixes on its own. Both files are owned by the action: local edits to them are replaced. If the PAT cannot write them the run logs a warning and still delivers the assessment.
4. Creates a folder named {student-login}/ in the instructor repository and writes the full assessment (questions and answers) to {student-login}/questions.md, overwriting any previous run for the same student. The folder is created automatically if it does not already exist.
5. Writing that file automatically triggers the Generate LMS Quiz workflow in the instructor repository, which produces an IMS Common Cartridge / QTI quiz package ({student-login}/{assignment-name}_{student-login}_quiz.imscc) for that student, ready to import into any LMS that supports Common Cartridge — an open standard supported by most major platforms, including Brightspace, Canvas, Moodle, Blackboard Learn and Sakai. Brightspace users only also get an alternative: {student-login}/{assignment-name}_{student-login}_brightspace_quiz.csv, the same questions in Brightspace's own question-import format (see Which quiz file to use). It works only in Brightspace — anyone on another LMS can ignore it. Every run checks all students but skips any whose questions.md is unchanged since their quiz was last built, so normally only the student who just pushed gets a new file; a change to the quiz package format rebuilds every student's quiz in a single run. You can also run the workflow manually from the Actions tab to regenerate every student's quiz at once.

The student-facing report is unaffected — whether it includes answers is still controlled by the existing include_answers input.

Prerequisites

See the Instructor Setup guide for full step-by-step instructions, including how to create the PAT and add it as an org-level secret so all student repositories inherit it automatically.

In short:

1. Create a PAT with repo and workflow scopes (classic) or Contents + Workflows read/write permissions (fine-grained). The workflow scope is required to commit the generate-lms-quiz.yml workflow file into the instructor repository, both on creation and whenever a later release updates it.
2. Add it as an org-level Actions secret named INSTRUCTOR_REPO_TOKEN — this makes it available to all student repos without any per-repo configuration.

If you set this up before the workflow scope was required, update the existing token — a repo-only PAT warns on every run and never picks up quiz-generation fixes. See Already have an instructor PAT?.

Example workflow

Copy this file to .github/workflows/grill-my-code.yml in the student repository.

name: GrillMyCode

on:
  push:
    branches: ["main", "master"]
  workflow_dispatch:

# A new push cancels any run still in progress for the same branch,
# so only the latest commit is ever assessed (see FAQ).
# Do not modify this setting unless you have a compelling reason to.
concurrency:
  group: grillmycode-${{ github.workflow }}-${{ github.ref }}
  cancel-in-progress: true

jobs:
  generate-questions:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    timeout-minutes: 15
    permissions:
      contents: write  # gmc-assessments release + PDF asset
      issues: write    # assessment issue
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0    # full history required for diff resolution

      - uses: NSCC-ITC-Assessment/GrillMyCode@v1
        with:
          github_token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
          api_key: ${{ secrets.OPENROUTER_API_KEY }}
          # If desired, uncomment this input and edit to use a different one —
          # any model from https://openrouter.ai/models (provider/model-name).
          # ai_model: "google/gemini-3.5-flash-lite"
          num_questions: "20"
          # Store a full Q+A copy in the private instructor repository.
          # The repository is created automatically if it does not exist.
          instructor_repo_token: ${{ secrets.INSTRUCTOR_REPO_TOKEN }}

Classroom 50 setup

For a Classroom 50 classroom cs-principles and assignment slug hello:

• Student repos: your-org/cs-principles-hello-student-login
• Instructor repo (auto-created): your-org/cs-principles-hello-grillmycode-instructor
• Files written per student: student-login/questions.md, student-login/cs-principles-hello_student-login_quiz.imscc, and — as an alternative for Brightspace users only — student-login/cs-principles-hello_student-login_brightspace_quiz.csv

Both names are resolved automatically — no configuration is needed beyond the token, and it makes no difference whether the assignment has a template. A team-mode repository (cs-principles-hello-group-3) is filed under group-3/.

Repositories not created by Classroom 50

Instructor delivery relies on Classroom 50's repository naming to tell the assignment and the student apart. In any other repository the action skips it with a warning; the student's assessment issue and PDF are still produced.

Instructor report contents

The instructor copy always contains:

• Questions and answers (regardless of the include_answers setting)
• Student GitHub login and source repository name
• Commit range reviewed (base → head SHA)
• The list of code files assessed (the same filtered list the student report shows)
• Assignment context files used (if any)
• AI provider and model