Not exactly, but depending on the course you can get pretty close. In my engineering statics and solids classes, it mapped well with what you'd be expected to do when working as a stress engineer (which is what I worked in after school). In my heat transfer course, it mapped well with the responsibilities of a thermal engineer.

ideally, the material itself would be designed to get a good distribution of As, Bs, and Cs with a few Ds and Fs for people who didn't try or understand at all. but it's pretty hard to get this exactly right. better to err on the side of making things a little too hard. then the occasional bright student will really shine, and you have enough signal to compress the range into the expected letters at the end.

And that's exactly what my professors who didn't curve managed to do. It was clear they worked very hard at prioritizing the important material, teaching it well, and testing it fairly. It was a breath of fresh air.

But when the average score on an exam in one of my other classes was 22% -- and they weren't looking for the next Einstein, it was just another upper division engineering class, presumably the geniuses would have revealed themselves by that point -- it was clear that the professor wasn't even trying. Throw a bunch of crap on the test and let the curve sort it out, so the professor could get back to what they really wanted to spend their time on: research.