<p>I'm a freshman at UW-Madison. I've never been through any college exams or finals. I heard most people say there are some sorts of curves. I know what the curve is. I had some curves in very hard classes in high school. However, I'm not sure if the curve in UW-Madison is different from the curve I had in high school. Let say there is a college exam with the max score of 100. The averaged score is like 60, and it is curved out of 80. If I got 85/80. Would I get 85 on my grade or I would end up with 80 no matter if I got any higher. Basically, in other words, is it possible to get over 100% in the class (not considering extra credits, only test and quiz scores). I want a definite answer please, so don't guess if you don't know. It would be nice if someone who has had classes at UW-Madison before tell me how it works or a parent who has children that go here and know about it. </p>
<p>You need to pay attention to each individual class’s grading system. If you can’t find the information ask for it. There is no university wide system. Also look at what will show up on your transcript (your report card in HS). A, AB, B… came into being decades ago, may change. Your professor may decide on a different grading curve for every exam as some may be more difficult to score highly on.</p>
<p>I would like to see UW add some version of the A+ as grade inflation has compressed GPAs so much. They could even limit it to a small % of students in any class–maybe 2% or so for really superior level work.</p>
<p>@lifemeaninseeker: Two of my kids have graduated from UW-Madison - The only class they took that I’m aware of offering extra credit was the Introduction to Psychology course - students could earn extra credit by participating in psychology experiments conducted by upperclassmen/grad students. I have never heard them mention anything about earning over 100% on any assignment in any class. </p>
<p>You may like to look at the grade distribution report (links below) - you can see the percentage of grades of A, AB, B, BC, D, D, F that students earned in each section of every course for previous semesters.Some classes, like Econ 101 and Psych 202 have department-specified percentages of grades (you won’t see one Psych 202 professor handing out 40% A grades while the others are all at 15%).</p>
<p><a href=“https://registrar.wisc.edu/course_grade_distributions.htm”>https://registrar.wisc.edu/course_grade_distributions.htm</a></p>
<p><a href=“https://registrar.wisc.edu/documents/Stats_distribs_2013-2014Spring.pdf”>https://registrar.wisc.edu/documents/Stats_distribs_2013-2014Spring.pdf</a>
For example, go to page 289 and look for Psychology 202: you will see that students earned a grade of A about 15% of the time - because that is mandated by the department for that course. Lecture 001 was taught by Professor Henriques - he does the 15% A grade limit BEFORE adding in the extra credit points - so his percentage is slightly higher.</p>