Academic self-efficacy has long been viewed as a determinant of academic performance; efficacious students tend to adopt metacognitive strategies to improve their learning. However, some students may possess inflated self-efficacy, which does not translate into higher performance. This study examined self-efficacy, metacognitive learning strategy use, and expected and actual academic performance in an agricultural microbiology course. Two questions guided the study: 1) what is the correlation between expected and actual exam scores, and 2) what factors predict expected and actual exam performance? The population for this study was students (N = 39) enrolled in an animal microbiology course at [University]. At the conclusion of each of three exams, students reported their expected score and completed an online survey measuring self-efficacy and metacognitive learning strategy use. Data were averaged for each student across all administrations for analysis. The relationship between expected and actual exam scores was substantial and positive (r = .80). The model predicting expected exam scores was statistically significant (F(9,29) = 4.32, p =.001, R² =.57,) with self-efficacy predicting students’ expected exam performance (B = 8.29, p = .001). The model predicting exam performance was also statistically significant (F(9,29) = 3.16, p =.009, R² = .50,) with self-efficacy again predicting students’ exam performance (B = 17.73, p = <.001.). No metacognitive learning strategies predicted expected or actual exam performance. In contrast to other studies, results indicated that students were reasonably accurate in predicting their exam performance. Further, self-efficacy was the best predictor of both expected and actual performance. This poses an interesting question: given that self-efficacy is task-specific and measurements were made immediately after exam completion, was self-efficacy a determinant of performance, or was expected performance a determinant of self-efficacy? Future research should examine the lack of association between metacognitive learning strategies and self-efficacy, expected, and actual exam performance.