📝 How to Generate Student Result Sheets as PDFs using Google Apps Script, Google Sheets, and Google Docs

Creating personalized student result sheets manually can be tedious. But with Google Sheets, Google Docs, and a little Apps Script magic, you can automate the whole process—generate custom PDF reports in seconds!

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🎯 What You’ll Learn

By the end of this tutorial, you’ll be able to:

✅ Automatically generate result sheets from Google Sheets ✅ Use a Google Docs template to format each student’s result ✅ Save each result as a PDF file in your Google Drive

Let’s get started!

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📊 Step 1: Prepare Your Google Sheet

1. Open Google Sheets and create a new spreadsheet.
2. Enter your student data like this:

Name	Math	English	Science	Total
Ken Obi	85	78	90	253
Ada Okeke	92	88	95	275

1. Rename your sheet tab to Sheet1 (or any name you prefer—just remember to update it in the script).

🎯 Tip: Add more subjects or fields as needed. Just match the placeholders in the Google Doc template (we’ll get to that next).

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📄 Step 2: Create the Google Docs Template

1. Go to Google Docs and create a new document.
2. Write a basic result format using placeholders like this:

STUDENT RESULT SHEET

Name: {{Name}}

Scores:
- Math: {{Math}}
- English: {{English}}
- Science: {{Science}}

Total: {{Total}}

1. Save it as Result Template (or any name you like).

2. Copy the Document ID from the URL.

   Example URL:

   https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AbCDeFGHIJKlmnoPQRS4567xyz890/edit
                                     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
                                       👆 This is your Doc ID
   

You’ll need this Doc ID for the script.

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🧑‍💻 Step 3: Add the Apps Script Code

1. Go back to your Google Sheet.
2. Click on Extensions > Apps Script.
3. Delete the default code and paste this:

function generateResultSheets() {
  const sheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSpreadsheet().getSheetByName("Sheet1");
  const data = sheet.getDataRange().getValues();
  const headers = data[0];

  const templateId = 'YOUR_DOC_TEMPLATE_ID_HERE'; // Replace with your actual Doc ID
  const folder = DriveApp.createFolder('Student Results'); // Create a new folder

  for (let i = 1; i < data.length; i++) {
    const student = {};
    headers.forEach((key, index) => {
      student[key] = data[i][index];
    });

    const copy = DriveApp.getFileById(templateId).makeCopy(`${student.Name} Result`, folder);
    const doc = DocumentApp.openById(copy.getId());
    let body = doc.getBody().getText();

    for (let key in student) {
      body = body.replace(new RegExp(`}`, 'g'), student[key]);
    }

    doc.getBody().setText(body);
    doc.saveAndClose();

    const pdf = DriveApp.getFileById(doc.getId()).getAs('application/pdf');
    folder.createFile(pdf).setName(`${student.Name} Result.pdf`);

    // Delete the temp doc
    DriveApp.getFileById(doc.getId()).setTrashed(true);
  }

  SpreadsheetApp.getUi().alert("All result sheets generated successfully!");
}

1. Replace 'YOUR_DOC_TEMPLATE_ID_HERE' with your actual Google Docs Template ID.
2. Click Save (💾 icon) and name your project, e.g., GenerateResults.

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▶️ Step 4: Run the Script

1. Click the Run ▶️ button.
2. The first time you run it, Google will ask for permission—review and allow.
3. Sit back. The script will:

✅ Create a copy of the template for each student ✅ Replace placeholders like ,, etc. ✅ Save the filled document as a PDF ✅ Place all PDFs inside a folder called Student Results

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🧠 How It Works

Here’s what’s going on under the hood:

• Read data from your Google Sheet row by row
• Create a copy of the template Doc for each student
• Replace placeholders like , with real scores
• Convert the Doc to PDF
• Save it in your Drive
• Trash the Doc copy to keep things clean

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✅ Final Thoughts

This setup is powerful for:

📌 Report cards 📌 Certificates 📌 Personalized letters 📌 Or anything else with templates!

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