I’ve been think about what classes I’m going to take for junior and senior year (yes I’m a sophmore, but I like to have a plan). My school offers both AP and IB. Usually by the students IB is considered more rigorous (I’m not sure about the GC, but if she says IB is more rigorous, I definatley go with that) However since most colleges offer the same credit for a 2 year HL course as they do a single AP and offer no credit for SL’s it just seems to me that it would just be a lot smarter to take a lot of AP’s instead of doing IB. I’m still conflicted though. Does anyone have any insight?
It depends on the school, but I was in the full diploma programme and took a couple AP classes, and the IB classes were definitely harder. However, colleges value IB and AP equally, so a full IB schedule vs. a full AP schedule is a wash.
In regards to college credit, yes, you would probably be able to receive more credit from AP classes than IB classes, especially since most schools only accept HLs. It depends on the school, though; at my school, I got credit for IB English HL and IB History of the Americas HL, which was worth 12 credits, while the AP equivalent was worth 6. If your main priority is getting college credit, the AP path would be the better route.
In general, though, I believe my IB education was worth it, as did the overwhelming majority of my classmates. For what it’s worth, almost everyone after their freshmen reported that they found freshman year of college to be easier than junior and senior years of high school. They said they were better prepared than their counterparts who took AP classes. This isn’t necessarily true everywhere, but it is something to consider.
I believe which one you ultimately choose should be based on your preferred learning style for exams: if you’re a fan of writing long essays and oral presentations, then go with IB. If you’d rather answer multiple choice and short answer questions, go with AP. If you ultimately decide to go with IB, start at full diploma, and if you feel like you can’t handle the workload from the internal and external assignments, don’t hesitate to drop down to partial IB, or switch to AP classes.
Good luck, and if you have any additional questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to message me!
The advice from metsfan sounds spot on based on my son’s IB experience vs. his friends’ AP experience. The quality of IB (and presumably AP) depends a lot on the individual school. As noted above, colleges value them equally.
Thank you both @metsfanAJM @Pootie ! I like the IB testing format and idea of doing the extended essay. How feasible would it be study and take AP exams for your SL subjects? Do they AP exams cover far more material?
@Madeline25: AP does cover more material than SL classes, but in most classes (Specifically, sciences), there is enough of an overlap so that you’d only have to learn a few more chapters of material rather than an entirely new course. I didn’t have the option to do this at my school, but I would have if I had the chance.
However, I would not recommend doing this for a foreign language SL class. I know kids who got 6s and 7s in IB Spanish who decided to take the Spanish SAT II or the AP Spanish exam and struggled because the format was so different from IB. Just something to keep in mind.
@metsfanAJM Ok thanks! I did want to do the AP test for French, but there is no AP French at my school, just SL so it really wouldn’t matter anyways.
For American students planning to go to college in the US, the IB diploma is probably not worth it. That’s not to say the courses aren’t worth it.