<p>So my school is starting the IB program next year and I had a few questions about it for those who have already been through the program or are going through it now.
1) should i risk taking the IB program since the teachers wont have any experience with the classes?
2) Is ToK a useless and pointless class?
3) Has it been hard for you to get college credit for you Ib classes, especially sl classes?</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>hahaha, I had the pleasure of spending my last two years in a fledgling school’s IB program. let me tell you, it is QUITE interesting. I’ll answer your questions and hopefully give you some extra insight, as you are about to take some life-changing steps.</p>
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<li><p>if you are resourceful, you will teach yourself. yes, it will be hard, and yes, your teachers will be inexperienced, but you will be able to get through it. during my junior year, not a single one of my teachers had any experience with IB. so, when senior year rolled around and we got new staff, we had to make drastic changes. We did all of HL English and HL biology in one year as a result, on top of many other things. prepare for disorganization and don’t count on your school to stay on top of you. I did my EE in a month. if I could go back, I’d have spread it out better. always stay on top of the material and go ahead a little bit. I regret that we just finished covering the options last week, despite IB exams starting this week. time is tight if you let yourself go at the pace of the teachers, who think that 2 years is enough time to cover all the material at a leisurely pace. you still have to go fast, so go fast on your own if you have to. </p></li>
<li><p>TOK really depends on the teacher. junior year we had a horrible guy who made us want to kill ourselves, but senior year it was more fun. if your teacher turns the class into a forum for discussion of stuff, rather than a lecture hall, then the class will be fun. otherwise, no. it’s really nice to think introspectively though, and TOK is a good outlet for that.</p></li>
<li><p>as far as credit goes, AP is easier. what some kids do at other schools than mine is take AP tests in the IB classes they take, so that they can get credit no matter what. this is probably a good idea, since many places will give credit for an AP 5 or an IB 7. the AP 5 is much easier to get and could take off a lot of pressure come IB exam time. if I could go back and take the calc BC, physics, bio, history, etc. AP tests, I’d do it in a heartbeat. </p></li>
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<p>in my experience, being a student at a fledgling IB school is like being an entrepreneur. there is a lot of risk involved, and a whole lot more work than you’d have at an established place, due to the extreme lack of disorganization. my school is famous for having us do all of our IAs in a 3 month period, and teaching material up until the day before IB exams and still not being done. that’s painful. many kids will get 5’s and 6’s, while at any organized school, they’d get 7’s. those are the downsides.</p>
<p>but I think colleges know how much risk and extra work is involved, because our class, which is not that smart or competitive, got into crazy colleges. we have a class of 61 and had people get into MIT, Columbia, Duke, Harvey Mudd, Rice, Cornell, Brown, UChicago, Berkeley, many of the other UCs, USC, UT honors programs, Carnegie Mellon, Vanderbilt, WUSTL, and other notable schools that I’m probably forgetting. for a tiny, non-competitive high school with no prior reputation (we are also the first graduating class), that is nothing short of amazing. nobody has international fame or huge awards, yet kids much smarter than us are getting rejected by colleges that are giving us scholarships. I strongly suspect that it’s because they know what we are going through as the first class of a fledgling IB program. of course, the sample size is tiny but for this many kids (maybe 30% of our graduating class) to get into their reach schools, something must be up. </p>
<p>So basically, in my eyes, going to a new IB school gives you the opportunity to shine if you so desire. it’s a lot of work, but I think it’s been worth it.</p>
<p>yeah i think i stick with the ap program at my school. The teachers have been teaching it for years and i’ve spoken with the future ib coordinators, and they all seem so confused. Also ap is just as good as Ib, but thanks for your response, it helped a lot</p>
<p>I figured I would chime in as well…</p>
<p>I wouldn’t discount IB completely so quickly. IB really has impacted a lot of my friends who are diploma kids. I’ve taken some IB classes but never taken an IB test. Check with the colleges you’re looking at/could potentially attend because some colleges don’t even accept IB and some only take HL classes. Taking IB even if your college ends up not accepting it isn’t necessarily a waste, but in that case I’d suggest AP over IB simply because of the college credit.</p>
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<li><p>I agree with what theyeaman said. You simply cannot trust your school and teachers to prepare you. The kids I know who simply think that doing the assigned reading will get them credit on the IB tests are foolish, it definitely takes a little extra on the students’ part to score high. It’s definitely possible though if you apply yourself. Definitely keep in touch with some IB kids from different schools if possible and try to make sure that you’re aligned with them. Also, the internet has some great resources if you do the IB route.</p></li>
<li><p>TOK is nicknamed therapy for IBers at my school. It really depends on the teacher from what I’ve heard. Don’t be fooled into thinking that TOK will be a cakewalk class though, at all the IB schools I know it actually is a pretty deep class that requires a good dose of reading. Nothing out of the ordinary or overloaded, but it’s work and not just something to take up a class period.</p></li>
<li><p>I obviously can’t answer this, but looking at some of my friends…two good friends of mine are diploma kids and are going to colleges where they are receiving no credit from IB. They took AP tests though for the IB classes they were in so that’s covering them. Another diploma kid is receiving a full ride to college and receiving credit for IB, but she’s not getting the full ride because of IB but because of test scores/GPA. The rest of the diploma kids I know are going to CC or the local uni…but something to keep in mind is that the kids going to CC or local uni are the ones who didn’t apply themselves fully and didn’t bother looking for colleges that would give them IB credit. Just be thinking ahead I suppose.</p></li>
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<p>And I agree again with theyeaman. At a new IB school, you can definitely shine.</p>