Spring 2027

Theory of Interest

Theory of Interest covers time value of money, discrete and continuous compounding, annuities, bonds, loans, interest rate structures, and portfolio immunization.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Kirk Peter4.5/5

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Kirk Peter

The class involves significant homework and a final exam worth 50% of the grade, requiring consistent practice to succeed.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Understand and illustrate the impact of the time value of money on decisions both in their professional and personal life.

  • Differentiate between the different types of measures of rate of return and return on investment and calculate those rates given a set of cash flow assumptions.

  • Compare and contrast the dynamics of key financial instruments including annuities, bonds and loans as well as calculate the price and other significant values of these instruments.

  • Demonstrate the importance of immunizing asset and liability portfolios against changes in interest rates and describe methods of immunization.

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
C
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F

All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

MATH 213, 222, or declared in the Business Exchange program

ACTSCI 303 used by

“Used by” includes alternatives; linked courses may have other requirements. This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027

Kirk Peter

Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 4.82/5 from 56 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

For this course: 4.7/5 raw quality · 2.8/5 difficulty · 18 reviews

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Past student reviews · Kirk Peter

Kirk Peter teaches a difficult course where the final exam is worth 50% of the grade. Students found the provided textbook hard to understand and lectures fast-paced, often relying on external resources like Coaching Actuaries to learn the material effectively.

Opinions on Kirk Peter vary; one student found him condescending, while another found him accessible and held review sessions outside office hours. Another student noted he brings real-world actuarial experience into lectures, though some found him intimidating.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2025: 3.34 GPA, 59.3% A/AB (n=54 letter grades); Fall 2025: 3.27 GPA, 60.5% A/AB (n=76 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.33 GPA, 63.6% A/AB (n=66 letter grades).

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

KIRK PETER is recorded teaching in Fall 2006, Spring 2007, Fall 2007, Spring 2008, Fall 2008, Spring 2009, Fall 2009, Spring 2010, Fall 2010, Spring 2011, Fall 2011, Spring 2012, Fall 2012, Spring 2013, Fall 2013, Spring 2014, Fall 2014, Spring 2015, Fall 2015, Spring 2016, Fall 2016, Spring 2017, Fall 2017, Fall 2019, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Fall 2022, Fall 2023, Spring 2024, Fall 2024, Spring 2025, Fall 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 550

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
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Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Kirk Peter

Kirk Peter teaches this challenging actuarial course with humor and real-world experience, though students find the material demanding.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2025: 3.34 GPA, 59.3% A/AB (n=54 letter grades); Fall 2025: 3.27 GPA, 60.5% A/AB (n=76 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.33 GPA, 63.6% A/AB (n=66 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Kirk Peter

The class involves significant homework and a final exam worth 50% of the grade, requiring consistent practice to succeed.

Past student reviews · Kirk Peter

Students appreciate his accessibility and review sessions, but some found the textbook unhelpful and the lecture pace too fast for note-taking.

Topics

  • Time value of money and compounding methods
  • Valuation of loans, sinking funds, annuities, and bonds
  • Interest rate structures, duration, immunization, and swaps

Skills

  • Calculate rates of return and return on investment from cash flow assumptions
  • Value financial instruments including annuities, bonds, and loans
  • Apply portfolio immunization techniques against interest rate changes

Grades

Historical instructor

Spring 2027 · Projected

Before grades are released

– average GPA

Approximate 80% prediction interval

About this estimate

The course’s semester-average GPA, not an individual student’s grade. The center uses 5 same-season terms, weighted toward recent results.

The range uses the finite-sample 80th-percentile rank of absolute errors from earlier same-season forecasts. Each forecast uses only records from earlier terms. At least four forecasts are required; bounds are rounded outward and limited to 0–4. This is an empirical estimate: changing instructors or grading policies can reduce its coverage.

8 earlier forecasts · 0.13 GPA average error.

Grades over time

Through Spring 2027

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

Download part 1
Selected offering source records
ACTSCI 303 · Spring 2027

Theory of Interest

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:242:011640",
    "course_id": "ACTSCI 303",
    "course_uid": "course_0dc2eef4cc55721b49c22e15",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "011640",
    "source_subject_id": "242",
    "title": "Theory of Interest",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 3,
    "typically_offered": "Spring"
  }
]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews
Download part 1
Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "8a4837134806782c3e84f70dbe4f74df6ed382166db2da43ba1a08da3b7b032d",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}