Tell me about International Baccalaureate

[Geoff_M]

I agree if may not give you an edge if you are not top 10 in your high school in addition to IB.

I'm not going to say that no school anywhere recognizes it, but I think that being in the 10 top of your class plays a larger role in your success in impressing schools than does the IB endorsement. But in the cases of two of my daughter's close friends (both of them National Merit Scholars and at the top of the class) it scored a zero with the U. of Michigan. Also, as pointed out above, when colleges are making their selections, they don't even know if you will actually earn the endorsement. The most direct benefit in our school is that the grades for IB classes are weighted and it helps boost your GPA... but the same goes for AP classes.

Again, if the program "works" for your child, that's great. But realize that the tangible benefits aren't what they are often positioned as by the proponents, and don't think that your kid will be academically handicapped if you don't run them through the IB gauntlet with their peers.

 

[Zandy595]

Geoff and QueenRocks, thank you for taking the time to post your opinion. I want to hear all sides, so I can help DS make an informed decision.

He gets frustrated with homework now. Not that he doesn't know how to do it, but just the fact that he has to do it. I don't think the IB program would be a good match for him.

 

[ObserverNY]

Greetings,

I am one of the administrators of Truth About IB. I have been following this discussion and feel compelled to add a few comments.

Lady Lacrosse said:

When IB took over at my school, they replaced all the AP courses.

An interesting choice of words. "Took over". That's what IB does. The program does not operate alongside AP as most schools have a limited number of "accelerated" students to fill "advanced" courses. The two educational programs are competitors. When a school is authorized by IB (and EVERY school that has ever paid the onerous application fees IS authorized) it becomes an IB World School. School officials direct resources and best teachers to handle the program at the expense of other programs and non-IB students. IB creates an atmosphere of elitism. It has also caused controversy and divisiveness in communities around the United States.

I'm sure the parent who attended an IB informational meeting the other night did not hear any mention of IB's affiliation with UNESCO. This is something administrators and IB officials either flat out deny or attempt to camouflage by claiming that the UN has nothing to do with the actual lessons. The next thing they tell you is you can't understand how wonderful and "rigorous" IB is unless you've taken the classes. Baloney to both.

IB is not as transparent as AP. You can visit the College Board website and obtain for free the syllabi for any of the 37 AP courses. Not so with IB. If you want to see what your child will be covering in IB, you have to purchase the course guide from the IB Store. Furthermore, AP is much more flexible in terms of accommodations for students with special needs and exam fee reduction for those of limited income.

Those who buy into the IB designer label will fight to the bitter end to defend its propaganda, even going so far as to bring in the ACLU to keep their pet program and utter death threats against Board members who wisely seek to purge their schools of the program. Public schools should be apolitical. IB is far from apolitical. Its "themes" revolve around radical environmentalism, ultra-feminism and are anti-American in their focus. IB states its mission is to create "global citizens".

American educators and BoEs have used IB for social manipulation to put a "rigorous" politically correct face on integration in their quest to close the achievement gap. It is a very expensive, left-wing tool designed to either grab federal Title I grant money or soak wealthy communities of their hard earned taxdollars. As a rule, 5 of the 6 IB Diploma exams are not given until the end of senior year and the diploma is not awarded until a student is in their Freshman year of university. Thousands of IB students have been disappointed by not gaining admission to their first choice universities because at the time they apply, there are no "standardized" exams on their transcript, only "projected" grades. In contrast, by the end of 11th grade, an AP student could already be named an AP Scholar having successfully passed 3 AP exams.

Please feel free to write to me at info@truthaboutib.com with any personal questions you might not want to appear on a public message board.

 

[pirateofthecarolinas]

Through my DD's Spanish immersion magnet school she is scheduled to start IB in 2 more years. She will start 9th grade in Spanish III. We haven't decided if that is the course that we want to take yet.

 

[Cindy B]

IB is not only for high schools. My district has IB programs for elementary and middle schools. My kids have gone to IB middle schools. As for the program, I don't think it really helped my son in high school however my daughter is really getting something out of that.

 

[ObserverNY]

Hi Cindy B,

You are absolutely correct, IB sells a PYP and MYP. Currently, there are only 179 PYP and 317 MYP schools in the United States. At best, it can be considered a "fringe program".

I am unable to post links yet, but if you go to the Truth About IB section which discusses PYP and MYP, you will find a link to a doctoral thesis on the MYP. The author studied the SOL results of IB and non-IB students and came to the conclusion that difference in results was statistically insignificant (<.05) IB claims that standardized exams don't measure the "value" of IB.

It is also important to note that IB requires the PYP to be implemented "schoolwide".

Indoctrination is hard to quantify.

 

[starrzone]

I agree with Geoff_M and his daughter's experience. At the time I was in high school, it went from grades 10-12 (now 9-12) and I started off in the full IB Diploma program in grade 10. I don't have the best time management skills either, but I was a straight-A student and had the lofty goal of going to med school, so naturally the "elite" IB program was a "natural" choice for me.

The experience was NOT good for me. I failed miserably in chemistry and math, so I dropped those courses in Grade 11. I did stay in French, English and History because I enjoyed those subjects and did well in them. Biology didn't go so great because there was SO much expected of us and, as Geoff mentioned, "the work was making me miserable" and I "was a walking zombie" a lot of the time. I was miserable. Once I dropped a bunch of the courses, I relaxed a bit.

I guess my biggest thing is that if your child is set on taking IB, only take the courses that he/she is truly interested in without expecting to get college/university credit out of it. Take the course because you like reading, or writing essays, not because you think that doing so will "get you a step ahead" or other such things.

 

[ObserverNY]

Starzone,

Thank you for sharing your experience.

As an aside, I noticed your tags, my daughter co-founded the Gay-Straight Alliance club in her IB HS (where she didn't take IB).

Just one question, how was your school able to begin the IBDP in Grade 10? That's an IB no-no, from what I understood. The regulations restrict the IBDP to ages 16-19, grades 11 & 12.

 

[Cindy B]

Hi Cindy B,

You are absolutely correct, IB sells a PYP and MYP. Currently, there are only 179 PYP and 317 MYP schools in the United States. At best, it can be considered a "fringe program".

I am unable to post links yet, but if you go to the Truth About IB section which discusses PYP and MYP, you will find a link to a doctoral thesis on the MYP. The author studied the SOL results of IB and non-IB students and came to the conclusion that difference in results was statistically insignificant (<.05) IB claims that standardized exams don't measure the "value" of IB.

It is also important to note that IB requires the PYP to be implemented "schoolwide".

Indoctrination is hard to quantify.

An elementary school in my district was the first PYP in the state. The MYP middle school program is the only one in the district as well and it is a full IB middle school.

Interestingly enough, this same district dropped the IB high school program due to cost and lower than expected enrollment. All IB faculty and staff schools in the district (approximatly half of the 18 district wide) had to vote to keep it in the actual schol itself. If the vote was 70% or less, IB was dropped from the school. AFAIK, only a few IB schools remained after voting.

 

[HSMndLKfan92]

IB sucks. I'm currently a junior and my school makes all of us take it. I've heard that it's for the better, but I get so much work to finish.

 

[starrzone]

Starzone,

Thank you for sharing your experience.

As an aside, I noticed your tags, my daughter co-founded the Gay-Straight Alliance club in her IB HS (where she didn't take IB).

Just one question, how was your school able to begin the IBDP in Grade 10? That's an IB no-no, from what I understood. The regulations restrict the IBDP to ages 16-19, grades 11 & 12.

Oops, you're right...they were pre-IB classes that I was taking in Grade 10. It's been 10 years since I graduated...some memory cells must have died...guess the program didn't do so much for me after all!

That's so cool, what your daughter did. Wish I had the guts to do that kind of thing when I was in high school; several good friends I have from back then have come out as G/L/B/T and I bet they would have liked to have had a club like that.

 

[starrzone]

IB sucks. I'm currently a junior and my school makes all of us take it. I've heard that it's for the better, but I get so much work to finish.

OOOOHHHH, this burns me, when a school FORCES all students to take the program. My brother went to a private school from grades 8-12 that has now become even more "exclusive" by making it mandatory for all students to take IB. I don't discount that many students DO get something out of the program; however, when the school might be the only alternative to public school your area offers, and the rigors of the IB program are not suited to your child, then it makes things even more difficult for him or her.

I'm glad my brother graduated well before these "rules" were put in place; he just graduated in June from community college and has a $28/hr job in a field he loves. Can't beat that!

 

[HSMndLKfan92]

OOOOHHHH, this burns me, when a school FORCES all students to take the program. My brother went to a private school from grades 8-12 that has now become even more "exclusive" by making it mandatory for all students to take IB. I don't discount that many students DO get something out of the program; however, when the school might be the only alternative to public school your area offers, and the rigors of the IB program are not suited to your child, then it makes things even more difficult for him or her.

I'm glad my brother graduated well before these "rules" were put in place; he just graduated in June from community college and has a $28/hr job in a field he loves. Can't beat that!

I go to a vocational school, geared towards the sciences. I guess the administration thinks that all of us are really smart. Most of us are, but you can tell there's a huge gap between those who excel and those who struggle.
2 science courses are HL.

I'm taking History and Spanish SL, and have block scheduling. I have 3 hours of history and spanish every other day. And only 90 minutes of either my bio or physics classes. I'm starting to think that I don't go to a science school.

 

[Longsx3]

My DD is an 8th grader and happens to be one of those gifted straight A students (please don't shoot me) however she will not be applying to the IB program that most of her classmates (her team is all GE) will be. We (but especially her) do not believe the IB program is a good fit, DD wants to take ASL as her foreign language but can't if she is in IB, Marine Bio also doesn't fit in. So she has opted for AP and Dual Enrollment Courses.

Last week I spoke to the HS Guidance Counselor about DD's choice, she fully supported her and says that she has seen many students make similar choices, including 2 sophomores that made all A's last year in IB but still chose to leave the program because they felt they were too one dimensional in the IB program.
The Counselor has suggested to place DD in AP Human Geography next year to keep her challenged and I think that will keep her very busy!

 

[ObserverNY]

Some really interesting school experiences being shared here, very cool.

There is a somewhat schizophrenic split in the way IB is presented to parents. I'm going to focus on the DP here, because imho, the PYP and MYP are simply junk "themes" designed to bilk extra money out of schools.

On the one hand, they say "IB is rigorous". The elitist image presented that the IB Diploma is some kind of golden ticket to the Ivies gives parents all kinds of false hope. On the other hand, they say, "Anyone can do IB as long as they are dedicated and work hard."

Which begs the question: Are these really "college-level" courses/exams like AP? The answer is no. IB bills itself as "college-preparatory". There is a reason for this. Unlike AP, despite being in business for 40 years, IBO has never bothered to properly vet its courses/exams with universities. AP normalizes the multiple choice section of its exams against 101 courses at universities. IB exams are "criterion referenced" - whose criteria? Well, IBO's of course. You hear a lot about the intense writing component of IB. I happen to be a fan of writing. I probably would have done exceedingly well in IB because of my love for writing. But let me tell you something. I have read a number of IB EE's and they're nothing to write home about. The ones I have read were filled with grammatical errors and rather poorly composed. And these were the handful IBO chose to feature on its website!

My 10th grade English teacher graduated from Oxford. He was a stickler. He demanded perfection. We diagrammed sentences in our sleep. If you failed to hand in homework, you got a big fat 0. He LOVED writing zeros in his grade book which he guarded like Fort Knox. He didn't need IB to teach his students how to write. In fact, I don't believe IB English even deals with diagramming sentences or proper grammar. This is why I tend to call IB International BS.

IB sucks.

Funny story. The daughter of one of our Board of Ed members who was the driving force behind infecting our school with IB, had the above quote as her tag on AIM.

 

[golfgal]

OOOOHHHH, this burns me, when a school FORCES all students to take the program. My brother went to a private school from grades 8-12 that has now become even more "exclusive" by making it mandatory for all students to take IB. I don't discount that many students DO get something out of the program; however, when the school might be the only alternative to public school your area offers, and the rigors of the IB program are not suited to your child, then it makes things even more difficult for him or her.

I'm glad my brother graduated well before these "rules" were put in place; he just graduated in June from community college and has a $28/hr job in a field he loves. Can't beat that!

They force kids to do this so they can get into the Newsweek top 100 schools list-which ranks schools on how many kids take AP tests or IB classes--doesn't matter if they all FAIL them, just that they take them so schools make it a requirement.

 

[ObserverNY]

They force kids to do this so they can get into the Newsweek top 100 schools list-which ranks schools on how many kids take AP tests or IB classes--doesn't matter if they all FAIL them, just that they take them so schools make it a requirement.

Bingo!

Mathews is IBO's #1 media mouthpiece in the United States. If you take a close look at the Newsweek list, you will find that a number of the top 20 schools are tiny IB charter schools.

Mathews also was hired by IBO to write his book Supertest: How the International Baccalaureate can Strengthen our Schools. The book was co-authored by Ian Hill, IBO's Deputy Director General and published by Open Court which is owned by Blouke Carus, an IBNA Board member.

I have had e-mail correspondence with Mathews for 5 years. I appear in Chapter 45 of his book. When I began investigating IB in my district, the ONLY documentation the school had in its files that constituted "research" about the program consisted of a copy of a letter to Mathews complaining about where our school landed in ranking on his List.

IB is a scam, plain and simple.

 

[agnes!]

...The higher level classes are slightly harder than the equivalent AP courses. ...

Really?
agnes!

 

[agnes!]

Bingo!

Mathews is IBO's #1 media mouthpiece in the United States. If you take a close look at the Newsweek list, you will find that a number of the top 20 schools are tiny IB charter schools.

Mathews also was hired by IBO to write his book Supertest: How the International Baccalaureate can Strengthen our Schools. The book was co-authored by Ian Hill, IBO's Deputy Director General and published by Open Court which is owned by Blouke Carus, an IBNA Board member.

I have had e-mail correspondence with Mathews for 5 years. I appear in Chapter 45 of his book. When I began investigating IB in my district, the ONLY documentation the school had in its files that constituted "research" about the program consisted of a copy of a letter to Mathews complaining about where our school landed in ranking on his List.

IB is a scam, plain and simple.

Who's "Mathews"?

Thanks,
agnes!

ETA: So Jay Mathews wrote a book extolling the virtues of IB? I had no idea...certainly could possibly call into question his impartiality as a journalist. I just know him from his stuff in the Washington Post and the high school rankings, didn't know he also writes for Newsweek. (Yes, yes, I know they're both owned by the same media group, I just never read Newsweek and didn't know .)

 

[ObserverNY]

Hi Agnes,

Sorry I didn't make that clear. After 5 years of bantering with the dude, I fell into the mindset that I assume everyone is as familiar with this subject as I am, when the reality is, most people still ask, "What's IB?" Yeah, I'd say he's been financially biased by IBO to write favorably on the subject.

If you go to the page IB in the Media at Truth About IB, you will find a pic of me and Jay dueling with pens. I cropped myself out of the pic except for my hand ... LOL