<p>How hard is it to get REALLY good grades there?</p>
<p>Really depends on the major. IU does release average GPA for each school, here it is below:</p>
<p>Interesting stuff, A2Wolves6.</p>
<p>What is most "telling" to me is not only the grade averages, but also the number of "W" and "WX" grades (withdrawals and "extended-X" withdrawals). It says a lot of students that could have been getting lower grades in certain classes are choosing to withdraw (and possibly retake the class) rather than get the lower grades the first time around. So, the averages may be a 3.0 to 3.1 GPA or so, but that's not counting the approximately two to three courses each student is dropping over their four to five years while at IU-B. Looks like one needs to factor this in when planning the number of courses to take to graduate.</p>
<p>the gradings a complete joke... dude im gonna be a soph at IU .. and if u get have a bad grade after the first 5-6 weeks u can just drop the course and take it ag ain... ur competing againts kids at IU... and there always seems to be a huge curve.. in almost every exam.. dnt sweat it dude.. just study hard on the weekdays.. and party on the weekends.</p>
<p>I graduated from IU last summer with a BS in Psychology and I can honestly say that looking back now, I didn't give it my all when I was there and I did just fine. I didn't get bad grades or anything (mostly B's), but now I wonder how many of them would have been A's if I would have tried my hardest. Of course grading depends on your major and professor (I would have the same upper level psych courses as other students in my major but we would have different professors and the grading procedures sometimes would be vastly different)... But anyways, the point of my post is even if you don't bust your butt all the time, you will probably end up doing OK because like 1ee304 said, most of the classes (especially the larger ones) have curves.</p>
<p>It's pretty important as a freshman to understand the so-called "Extended-X" policy for grading at IU. (I'm not an expert on this, but here is how I think it works--others should read and clarify it if I'm not posting the particulars correctly).</p>
<p>It basically says that until the time you have completed 45 units, you can drop a class (using a WX grade) and retake it under the understanding that the WX will be dropped if you retake it before you have completed 45 total units. It's a handy way to keep "W"s off of your report card for the first year or year and a half at the school. But, of course, you have to know about the policy, which is not advertised much. (It also applies if you take and get a D or C and want to retake for a higher grade)--although this isn't as helpful--since while the GPA is recomputed, the hours stay on the report card meaning that if you apply for a masters program, they will see that you retook the class.</p>
<p>My own son didn't know about this, and so has one W on his record that he could have had removed (you must specify that you want a WX, since a W cannot ever be removed--see the policy). My son also had one W this past semester, but that one couldn't have been removed since he was already over the 45 unit cutoff.</p>
<p>Here's the info on the policy--note that the current policy is the one at the bottom, the one at the top is the old policy:</p>
<p>Course</a> Retake Policy: Office of the Registrar: Indiana University Bloomington</p>