<p>I've seen many arguments about whether IB is better than AP or vice versa.</p>
<p>My concern is that, especially for my school, a student can only start taking IB courses from their junior year. When this happens, as IB courses are two-year courses, the exam results only come out during the summer of a student's senior year (basically when they graduate). This means the colleges won't see the actual scores in the student's applications.
On the other hand, the actual AP test scores can be given in the applications if the applicant takes the test before their senior year.
Since the IB scores cannot be given to the colleges, the schools which the applicant attends usually only give the colleges "predicted exam scores" for the applicant.
Because of this difference that colleges can know the AP test results but not the IB exam results, is there a disadvantage for applicants who take the IB program?</p>
<p>I am a teacher in a newly-accredited IB school, and my D just finished the college process. During the info sessions that I attended with her, I asked IB related questions for my information. The answers were fairly unanimous, from top-tiered schools. IB is considered the most rigorous program and if you are enrolled in it, schools understand your academic qualities, as they do if you are enrolled in all AP courses. They consider the two programs to be very, very similar, and very fine. IB scores, like AP scores, are used for placement, not for admission. The fact that you are in the IB program is what is considered for admission, as are all the other criteria (transcript, standardized scores, recommendations, essays, ECs, etc. etc. etc.) that go into your application. When your scores are reported in July, and you have them sent to the school you will attend, the school decides what to do with them, whether to give you advanced standing, or credit, or to just pat you on the back and say, “Good job.” </p>
<p>The IB Diploma Programme is always grades 11-12. Schools can also have Primary Years (grades 1-5) and Middle Years (grades 6-10), but your school is like all the others doing the Diploma Programme (spelling is IB!).</p>
<p>It’s a non-issue because the vast majority of schools offer only one program over the other, not both. Both programs are challenging and show a student’s abilities and motivation.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that you can do like most IB students and take AP exams your junior year, at least in your SL subjects. The vast majority of colleges don’t give SL credit or placement.</p>
<p>I have too. There is no GENERAL answer to that question. The local details of how the program is implemented, and how well prepared the teachers are to provide a program according to brand-name standards, trump the systematic brand-name differences between AP and IB. Find out LOCAL details about the programs in the high schools you are able to choose, and choose according to what fits your child. </p>
<p>In my town, students from AP high schools fare as well as students from IB high schools in getting into HYPS, which is the standard that some high school students on College Confidential use to evaluate high school programs. You can ask this question at college information sessions </p>
<p>and see how much college admission officers really care about this issue, as such. Or you can just do what is right for your own child. </p>
<p>My oldest son started taking AP tests as a ninth grader. He’s due to take some more as a tenth grader. The AP program is explicitly a flexible program with a lot of access to homeschoolers and self-studiers of all kinds, not tied to attendance at particular schools. That’s a feature that makes it the best fit for some learners.</p>
<p>Our school has recently started up a magnet program where students begin the IB Diploma Programme in their sophomore year and have their Diploma by the time they apply for college. Would this be advantageous to them? (I’m a froshie so I’m just taking a few APs, gifted classes and such, until I enter this)</p>
<p>A good IB program certainly can look good to even the most selective college. The IB program is a structured environment, and a student who stays with the program can learn a lot. There is more risk (because there are fewer adults looking after the learner) but possibly more gains in dual-enrollment at a local college for high school credit, because a self-motivated student could go beyond the IB level by high school graduation in such a program. What works best for each learner still depends on local circumstances.</p>