# Set submission rules

> Score Policy decides which submission counts toward the grade, how many attempts learners may submit, late penalties, and grading strategies (e.g. most recent vs highest).

Source: https://www.curacourse.com/help/score-policy-submission-rules-and-grading-strategy

## At a glance

**Score Policy** decides which submission counts toward the grade, how many attempts learners may submit, late penalties, and grading strategies (e.g. most recent vs highest).

## Prerequisites

- Lesson view → **Score Policy** panel.

## Steps

1. Open **Score Policy** and click **Add** or edit an existing policy.
2. Set **Policy will affect** (same target types as Access Policy: all learners, cohort, group, or specific students).
3. Configure submission rules:
   
   
   
   - **Submission limit** (when shown)
   - **Late penalty** toggles and penalty amounts/units
   - **Grading strategy** — e.g. **most recent**, **highest**, **first attempt**, **average**
   - Options such as allowing scores above max or negative scores when available
4. Save. The **All Learners** score policy cannot be deleted.

Cohort-specific policies can be reordered when multiple apply.

## Common gotchas

- Lightning Grader opens the policy-selected submission first; learners may have other attempts in **Score history**.
- Creating a new policy for a cohort may pre-fill defaults from the all-learners policy.

## Next steps

- [Grade a lesson with Lightning Grader](https://www.curacourse.com/help/grade-a-lesson-with-lightning-grader)
- [Score modifiers](https://www.curacourse.com/help/score-modifiers-bonuses-and-deductions)