Spring 2027

Geography of Wisconsin

Overview of Wisconsin's physical and human geography, emphasizing the physical, historical, and cultural processes that shaped the state.

offering recorded3 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Christian Andresen

Summary

1 / 6

Past student reviews · Elsa Noterman

One student reported seven grueling papers and never-ending readings, noting that rubrics were not very helpful.

What you’ll be able to do

  • Explain at a basic level the processes that shaped the physical geography of the state, including its bedrock geology, glacial landforms, soils, and natural plant communities.

  • Characterize the past and present physical geography of particular places within the state using key information sources, including public land survey records and web-based soil surveys.

  • Explain at a basic level how the cultural geography of Wisconsin reflects the Native Nations that have lived in this place for many thousands of years, the expropriation of their lands in the 19th and 20th centuries, and the new communities and cultural landscapes created by immigrant settlers.

  • Recognize distinctive characteristics of Wisconsin’s rural geography, including dairy farming and other kinds of agriculture that developed here, the history of logging and the cutover lands, and emergence of tourism and the conservation movement.

  • Use key information resources on rural geography, such as General Land Office records and first-hand accounts of Native American and immigrant communities.

  • Explain at a basic level the historical development and present-day spatial structures of Wisconsin cities, especially the geography of industrial development, racism, and segregation in the Milwaukee metropolitan area.

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

Sophomore standing

  • Sophomore standing
GEOG 342

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree
  • Sophomore standing

Professors

Spring 2027
Historical instructors & teaching patterns

ELSA NOTERMAN is recorded teaching in Spring 2020. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

ERIN CLANCY is recorded teaching in Spring 2025. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

JOSEPH ADLAND MASON is recorded teaching in Spring 2016, Spring 2022, Spring 2024, 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 001Online Only0 / 2000

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

Meeting source records

No records available.

Student experience

the class

Past student reviews · Erin Clancy

Past students described the online asynchronous format as beautiful, with assignments that were clearly detailed and thoughtfully designed.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.52 GPA, 79.6% A/AB (n=162 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.71 GPA, 86.1% A/AB (n=180 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.71 GPA, 86.5% A/AB (n=193 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

Past student reviews · Elsa Noterman

One student reported seven grueling papers and never-ending readings, noting that rubrics were not very helpful.

Past student reviews · Elsa Noterman

A past student found the learning topics super interesting and praised the instructor for being a quick email responder and super accommodating.

Topics

  • Physical geography: bedrock geology, glacial landforms, soils, and plant communities.
  • Cultural geography: Native Nations, land expropriation, and immigrant settlements.
  • Rural geography: agriculture, logging history, tourism, and conservation.
  • Urban geography: Milwaukee's industrial development, racism, and segregation.

Skills

  • Using public land survey records and web-based soil surveys to characterize physical geography.
  • Utilizing General Land Office records and first-hand accounts for rural geography analysis.

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 · 0.16 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
GEOG 342 · Spring 2027

Geography of Wisconsin

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": "1274:416:008247",
    "course_id": "GEOG 342",
    "course_uid": "course_d8b6e46af1baa9f13bba502e",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "008247",
    "source_subject_id": "416",
    "title": "Geography of Wisconsin",
    "credits_min": 3,
    "credits_max": 3,
    "typically_offered": "Occasionally"
  }
]
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": "fd9a2a4ad6ffb11f8ba5753b300496487ae90667b553255623ddb62247016ab1",
  "requirements_status": "valid",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}