diff --git a/spec/concerns/submission_scoring_spec.rb b/spec/concerns/submission_scoring_spec.rb
index 3a8ec5e7..ac4e8490 100644
--- a/spec/concerns/submission_scoring_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/concerns/submission_scoring_spec.rb
@@ -10,7 +10,10 @@ describe SubmissionScoring do
   let(:controller) { Controller.new }
   let(:submission) { FactoryBot.create(:submission, cause: 'submit') }
 
-  before { controller.instance_variable_set(:@current_user, FactoryBot.create(:external_user)) }
+  before do
+    controller.instance_variable_set(:@current_user, FactoryBot.create(:external_user))
+    controller.instance_variable_set(:@_params, {})
+  end
 
   describe '#collect_test_results' do
     after { controller.send(:collect_test_results, submission) }
@@ -22,7 +25,7 @@ describe SubmissionScoring do
     end
   end
 
-  describe '#score_submission' do
+  describe '#score_submission', cleaning_strategy: :truncation do
     after { controller.score_submission(submission) }
 
     it 'collects the test results' do
diff --git a/spec/support/database_cleaner.rb b/spec/support/database_cleaner.rb
index 38622291..910ebefb 100644
--- a/spec/support/database_cleaner.rb
+++ b/spec/support/database_cleaner.rb
@@ -22,8 +22,8 @@ RSpec.configure do |config|
     DatabaseCleaner.clean_with(:truncation)
   end
 
-  config.before do
-    DatabaseCleaner.strategy = :transaction
+  config.before do |example|
+    DatabaseCleaner.strategy = example.metadata[:cleaning_strategy] || :transaction
   end
 
   config.before(:each, type: :feature) do