<p>My high school is encouraging Ib students to also take the AP tests. I'm not sure what to do?</p>
<p>We just faced this issue with my son. It really depends on what colleges you are interested in and what they do with AP and IB scores. Many colleges treat IB higher level and AP essentially the same, so there may not be a reason to take the AP for those subjects. However, many schools do not give credit for standard level IB exams, so it may make sense to take the AP for that subject, if you've covered the material. In my son's case, he already knows where he is (almost certainly) going to college, and we looked at the specifics. For example, he was considering taking the AP Music Theory test, but learned that his school requires everybody to take a school-based theory test for placement even if they've taken the AP, so it makes no sense. He took French SL last year, and a 5 on the French AP can be used for placement, so he's going to take that one. For several other courses, APs can only be used at his college for acceleration (and not, for example, to get out of distribution requirements), so it makes no sense to take them, since he doesn't want to accelerate.</p>
<p>IB tests are 2 years long, while AP tests are only 1 year long, non?</p>
<p>From what I've heard from friends, the AP tests/courses, seem to be comparitively easier--though I'm not quite so sure about college policies towards IB and AP results. I would think it differs from college to college.</p>
<p>*correction: I meant the courses are 2 years and 1 years long!</p>
<p>lol, if the tests were that long...I don't even want to imagine it =P</p>
<p>I haven't taken an IB test, but I will say that everyone I know who took IB, even if they did well, and took AP has failed the AP test. Although this could simply be a result of the tests being very different from each other. As for policies, it varies. Some only take one, and others only the other. Many take both, and some none. Some even vary by major or school. Duke's science college for example, doesn't take any APs except to fill electives, but the engineering college does, requiring either 4s or 5s depending on the test; they do take all IBs however, with a few exceptions, as long as they are the higher level ones - all this from a friend of mine who is now at Duke's engineering school en route to pre-med because he wanted his APs to count!</p>
<p>ib tests thorough understanding of concepts (definitions, deriving equations, explanations for each detail)
ap tests also test thorough understanding of concepts, but by integrating many chapters worth of material into one problem (i.e. physics b tests may have problems that involve kinematics, incline, mechanics, etc in one problem - i’ve seen several in practice tests)</p>
<p>At my daughter’s high school, IB History of the Americas is taught so you are prepared for the AP US history exam. She took the IB course and made a 5 on the AP exam. She got the IB Diploma and took 5 AP classes. She also took AP Spanish and used that 5 for college credit so the IB Spanish HL exams were just for the IB Diploma . She receive 47 credit hours at our state flagship. The AP credit came through first but after the IB credit came through it was pretty evenly divided. You do need to check your potential schools. She got more credit than we expected. You might also consider if you want to take the AP exams to have a chance at being designated an AP Scholar.</p>