<p>I'm taking a zillion ap's. My school doesn't do IB. What the heck is it? how hard compared to on level, honors, ap? how much do college like it compared to those three? etc, etc etc.</p>
<p>APs are fine, IB is more respected and harder, but it in no way will affect you if you dont have them </p>
<p>jsut like a person whos school offers no APs would not be affected by not taking aps</p>
<p>I have no idea. I'm not familiar with IB but in both AP and IB you have to go through a ridiculously hard and long exam.</p>
<p>I heard that AP is much more difficult than IB, from several sources ??</p>
<p>I think it's considered that IB is harder than AP, on average.</p>
<p>IB is a program. AP is series of individual classes.</p>
<p>It all depends what classes you take. </p>
<p>An IB student with Environmental Studies and Math Studies will have a way easier time than someone in AP, whereas somebody taking Chem HL or a bilingual IB diploma (with History HL... yes, that means paper 3) in French, will have a much more difficult program than an AP student.</p>
<p>Generally though, IB is harder because like the above poster said, it is a program while AP is a series of classes. You need CAS/TOK/EE, and you have to take subjects you might not excel at.</p>
<p>The IB is easier. It is harder in the sense that you have no freedom to choose your classes so if a class is of no interest to you it may seem harder. It also depends on your High School. Almost all top high schools in IL only have AP while the lower high schools have the IB. So technically I guess why I vouch for AP being harder is clear. Taking AP classes in the top high school definitely is harder than taking IB classes in the 200 rank or so high school which has only 20% of their graduating class, if that, attending college.</p>
<p>your definitely generalizing IB to your area Nam3less....remember IB is an internaional program and around the world most, if not all, international private/presitigious high schools use programs like IB or similar.</p>
<p>You can find a decent descrition at wikipedia. Check out their description of the IB Diploma Programme.</p>
<p>My D just completed the IB program and I definitely think it was more work than my S taking his choice of AP courses. </p>
<p>The IB diploma is internationally recognized. It is an all-or-none program. You get the diploma or you have a year to retake the tests you need to get it. The tests are in two levels -- Standard Level (SL) or Higher Level (HL). You must take a minimum of three HL tests. Most colleges give credit for good scores on HL tests, but not SL tests. (BTW, my son got more AP credits than my daughter can get with her combination of AP and IB HL.)</p>
<p>Based on the number of students in my area that apply for the number of IB slots, it is recognized as prestigious. When we were doing the college visit routines, colleges said they viewed AP the same as IB HL.</p>
<p>i asked 17 ppl who took both......14 of them said AP is harder....i guess it depends on the person...just because u go through a series of classes in no way makes IB harder....most AP's u need a series of prerequisites so i mean idk....does it really matter? it just depends on the person. like i said most IB courses dont need major prerequisites, if u r in the program u just take the class, whereas with AP u actually need certain prerequisites and stuff....so idk it depends on the person.....a person taking AP Calculus BC vs a person taking IB Math might have a harder or easier time with it. It jus depends wha u like to do. no sense in arguing about it. if ur good at math over science then IB math will be easier over an AP science..point blank..the same with the other courses so dont argue over it.</p>
<p>In my school we have AP's... a lot of people can get into them, but the idiots that sign up generally drop them after they see the list of summer work. We also have a charter school in my town, they don't offer Ap's but do offer IB. A ton of people sign up for IB there, but I'm not sure how many actually get the diploma. When you compare the two schools, the students in AP at my school are a lot smarter than the kids that are in IB at the other school. But thats just my opinion and views, I'm sure it varies from town to town.</p>
<p>IB is CONSIDERED harder because it is a curriculum v. individual classes, but I doubt this as many of my friends in IB says it is very similar to AP in terms of difficulty.</p>
<p>IB really isnt hard. It is all about time management.</p>
<p>Individual IB classes are MUCH easier... it's just considered harder because all your classes are IB.</p>
<p>TOK is a relatively easy class (at my school it's open for AP kids as well with the exact same workload). My AP Spanish lit shared a class with IB Spanish HL and their work was a JOKE. They are the equivalent of AP Spanish lang (most of us took our sophomore or junior year.. they take it their senior) and their exam was ridiculously easy. We got to grade all of their work.</p>
<p>AP depends a lot more on the teacher for its difficulty than IB.</p>
<p>But IB's anti-American, so you probably shouldn't do IB.</p>
<p>IB is easier in the sense that you have two years for most subjects compared to AP where you have a year to learn everything...</p>
<p>I've also heard a lot of the tests were easier, ie French/Psychology...</p>
<p>However, IB demands a lot of things outside of class to get a Diploma. CAS (community service hours, I don't know the actual IB cut off but ours is 200 hours), Extended Essay (4,000 research essay on whatever topic you choose) and TOK (which is fun! but the speeches can get a little hectic). Now, the Extended Essay may seem easy, and the CAS might look like a breeze, but the EE is right on top of college applications...which makes it bad. Furthermore, we have "internal assesments", which is a bunch of stupid projects that can affect our overall exam grade...</p>
<p>So...AP is harder for the tests. IB is harder for living?</p>
<p>From my experience, IB covers a very broad scope of things and offers multiple perspectives, perfect if you going towards humanities. AP is more narrow but goes a lot more in depth. Much better if you are going into the Math/Sciences. + AP doesn't require you to take the class. Ppl argue that life is about taking the class (which they say is more important) and then taking the exam, but I would have to disagree. AP promotes people who want to accelerate as fast as they can. </p>
<p>As above poster says, CAS of 200 hrs isn't hard (esp since they train you to plan it out), Extended Essay is a breeze (anyone writing a research paper for siemens/intel, etc is already done), and the Internal Assessments aren't too bad. Most of my friends in IB suffer because they procrastinate, something that IB doesn't take kindly to.</p>
<p>You all are talking about IB being a program and you can't really select your courses as much and dont have as much freedom in that area and your forced to take classes as part of the program. My question is that since IB is international-known and everything, it prepares you and gives you required courses to get into colleges such as HYP right? Even though you cannot select as many of your courses</p>
<p>OH yeah...I look at a lot of college websites that basically want you to take four years of...well, everything...and I always go "Huh? You mean that's not normal?" So, yeah, you will have four years of math, science (well, you'll have 3 of one specific and one of the other), English (normal), History and a foreign language. You'll be veeery, very well rounded...</p>
<p>There are actually two options for IB-- it's not all or nothing. The path that requires the Theory of Knowledge class and Extended Essay and CAS hours is called the IB diploma program. However, you can elect to take individual IB classes but not participate in ToK, EE, and all that by participating in the IB Certificate program. I have heard that individually, IB classes are easy-- there are very few tests and papers (one or two per semester of each, even in English), but the papers are longer than those you'd do in normal classes. Also, for history and maybe English I think you don't even need to turn in the big papers until senior year (most classes are two- year commitments). So, the IB diploma program is more rigorous than taking assorted AP's, but if you have the choice between taking IB certificate courses and AP classes, go with the AP. However, one downside to the IB diploma is that it does offer very little flexibility in the courses you take, so it is harder to show your interest to colleges by way of the courses you take.</p>