<p>For those who have finished with the IB diploma and are currently in college or have applied, do you think IB was worth it? Compared to AP, what are the advantages? I'm a junior taking IB right now and my rank is pretty high, but sometimes I wonder if IB is really necessary for the amount of work I'm doing. Of course, I'm going to finish with what I've already started, but for those of you who have done IB... what's your take on it or honest opinion?</p>
<p>i think IB was hell, and at my school, not worth the effort. (too much busy work)
If you’re top in your IB class, then it pays dividends. but still admittance for those who are in IB and AP are basically the same (unless your school has no AP classes for you to take)
…it all comes down to GPA. get a good GPA, worth it. if not, DROP out before its too late! senior year will be INSANE! (rewarding experience in terms of accomplishing hard, demanding classes, but i don’t think its necessarily worth it to ruin your entire senior year just to be “prepared for college”)
who knows though… its all about personal preference… if you like being told which classes to take, then its for you… some people would rather have the freedom to pick and choose</p>
<p>I can’t answer your question because I’m not in college. But I’m currently an IB junior and I love it. I feel like I’m benefitting so much more from my classes than the AP kids; the class is actually preparing me for something other than a test at the end of the year. It is hard work but it’s definitely worth it. I guess it does depend on the school and personal preference though. I don’t find the workload to be that bad, so something such as hard work wouldn’t necessarily ruin senior year for me. If you despise working I suppose it would.</p>
<p>Not as familiar with IB vs AP but I have to say I question the excessive amount of work involved with AP for HS students. I can’t help but think that most students taking AP’s would be better off taking courses at local colleges that would be less time consuming and more manageable. What is the point of overloading HS students with 5 day/wk x 9 months of material for a single test that “might” translate to a 3 credit college course that will meet 4-6 hrs a week per college term during which time an average college student has way more free time to study the course content. Considering that a HS students time in school can range from 6-12 hrs a day depending on schedule & EC’s ect the work load of multiple AP’s is excessive and not proportional to actual college work loads.</p>
<p>coskat - Saving money and finishing college faster.</p>
<p>Do you reaaally want to finish college faster? (that’s assuming you don’t go to an ivy league school)</p>
<p>Option 1 - finish college 3 years, work for 51 years
Option 2 - finish college 4 years, work for 50 years</p>
<p>Come on, which one is honestly worse/better?</p>
<p>I also believe that at the high rate that people switch majors, getting college credit in advance won’t save that much in the long run anyway. I mean, what is one going to do if they have all that credit but is still unsure of what they want to do when they go to college? How can one be certain what he or she wants to do before they even step outside from under the care of their parents?</p>
<p>Having a lot of credits done in HS pretty much gives you the mindset that you MUST use it for your advantage, the thing is, people switch majors a lot anyways even though they walk in almost knowing for sure what they want to do. I don’t think AP/IB credits are generally that useful in that sense.</p>
<p>How much time & money is actually saved is very variable by school & major. Given the number of students taking AP’s you would think the grad rates would be 90% in 3-4 yrs at the well ranked schools that give full credit for AP of incoming students vs what averages currently are. The colleges do not want to lose $$ in tuition for $85 AP’s taken in HS. I think College Board is the one making out the most on the HS AP frenzy. Don’t get me wrong, I think HS students should be challenged but I think the current excess of AP work is not proportional to the actual college course work it is suppose to be equivalent to.</p>
<p>coskat, by college, you’re talking about state universities, right? or are some AP classes harder than ivy league classes as well?</p>
<p>Does USC recognize IB as much as other schools do? How much does 'SC actually care about whether you graduated from IB vs AP?</p>
<p>I can’t say I’d know how to objectively compare “hardness” of State vs Ivy intro freshman courses. It usually is intro courses that AP credit covers right? But I find it hard to believe that students who take year long AP in humanity type courses and get 4/5 on AP tests in HS would have any problem taking a 3 credit single term intro classes at State or Ivy schools and passing with less effort and busy work than AP’s requires year long in HS (assuming a college prep HS with well trained/experienced AP teachers who are knocking themselves out to make sure their students can do well on the AP exams).</p>
<p>I cant compare APs (cos we dont relli have that here)</p>
<p>But compared to our regular school system ( A levels) the standard of work is not THAT much different, both still do the same level of work. </p>
<p>Our standard school system (a levels) also allow us to have advanced standing in college. </p>
<p>(im from singapore BTW)</p>
<p>if you went into IB with the expectation that it will pay dividends in college admission or credit, you were quite deluded. </p>
<p>you should go into IB if you enjoy the academic rigour. not because you think it will look good on a college application. IB will prepare you to go to the best colleges in the world. it won’t get you in.</p>
<p>if you’re still obsessed w.impressing colleges, however, consider this: how will it look for you to be in an academically rigourous program and decide it’s not worth your time? some schools may not care. others will.</p>
<p>and really, if you can’t keep up with IB, maybe HYPMS isn’t for you, if that’s what you’re worried about.</p>
<p>Lol IB just feels like it’s a waste of life!</p>
<p>IB pays dividends like hell, Im in the first year IB graduating class at my school where there is AP and IB. We never had great results in colleges the best we ever had in our schools history was 1 Rice, 2 Duke, 1 Brown, 2 Berkely, 1 UMich, 2 Northwestern.</p>
<p>This year we had the best overall class, but IB did way better. here are the results </p>
<p>IB: 1 Cambridge, 2 LSE, 1 UCL, 1KCL, 2 Edinbourough, 1 MIT, 1 Penn (the Bio/Wharton program), 1 Columbia (John Jay scholar), 1 Willliams, 1 UChicago, 2 Northwestern, 1 UMich, 1 Brown, 1 UNC-Chapel Hill, 1 Berekly, 1 UCLA, 1 UCSD, 1 NYU w/$160,000, 2 UMiami (1 w/$150,000)</p>
<p>(btw IB only had 14 kids in the class)</p>
<p>AP: 1 Duke, 1 Rice, 1 Penn, 1 Northwestern, 1 JHU, 1 Franklin Olin, 1 USC, 1 Cornell</p>
<p>AP had about 30</p>
<p>IB won’t open doors for you, but it will make you a competitive applicant if you do well in the program. Now adays, every kid and their grandma are doing IB/AP/College class/honors, if you want to get into top schools, you’ll pretty much need a rigorous program. </p>
<p>But it’s more about the experience that comes with IB, and the courses are insanely helpful. If you do well in IB Bio I/II, you’ll breeze through those courses in college, and if you do well on the IB exam for it, then you can get ahead of the curb. At my school, the IB kids (I don’t know how many, but well over 100).</p>
<p>IB offers a multitude of courses that may not be otherwise offered, psychology, philosophy, anthropology, film, computer science, and more, so if any of these pique your interest, you’d benefit greatly. </p>
<p>AP has it’s virtues because it has alot of diverse courses that offer leg room, but AP is more about learning the facts and prepping you for the AP exam at the end of the year, I’d be damned if I met an AP english student who could write half an essay that an IB english student could, nonetheless give an oral commentary. IB benefits from being a 2 year program because you are prepared for the next year, and the ideals and teachings will be similar. For AP a class is one year, technically for IB it is one year, but if you want the diploma/certificate you need to stick it out for two years.</p>
<p>Finally, IB has “Theory of Knowledge”, which I have yet to experience, but it is supposed to enhance your view on learning and such, and it sounds like great “glue” to the IB program.</p>
<p>One of the most important things you’ll learn as you grow up is the importance of decision making. You can be an IB diploma student, an AP scholar, have a combination of both, do running start, the list goes on. It depends on what kind of learning you like, and how important it is to you.</p>
<p>As for the question, I do think IB will have been worth it. The wealth of knowledge that comes out of it enhances your perception on the world, and it really awakens your ability of critical thinking, debate, and more great virtues.</p>
<p>I enjoyed it. I was bored as hell in the other classes, even AP classes. </p>
<p>Do IB because you want to challenge yourself, not because you expect some big payoff at college, because it really depends on what college you end up at whether you get credit or find the classes to be easy or whatever.</p>
<p>No. Harvey Mudd gave me no credit. I placed out of intro to comp. sci. because I had taken IB CS SL (which was also completely worthless). Instead, I had to take a more advanced Mudd CS course which was much more difficult. While I learned a lot more than I would have otherwise, this advanced course serves absolutely no purpose to me as a physics major.</p>
<p>Also, I took IB Physics HL. Since we didn’t cover rotational kinematics, I didn’t place out of the second semester physics course. Had I taken AP Physics C, which I would have done if I weren’t in IB, I wouldn’t have had to take that class either. To be fair, though, I took a few AP tests and only managed to get a half-semester class waived, so in all honesty both programs are useless :P</p>
<p>But I’ll back up for a moment because Hanajima Arashi’s post is starting to make more sense to me. I guess for credit it was worthless, but I’m a much more dedicated worker after going through that. Hours of problem sets at college were still new to me, but I handled them a lot better than my non-IB classmates. I will go ahead and attribute my high college GPA to the IB program.</p>
<p>Doing IB makes you a better person. You’re just more educated after going through it. Whether you care or not is a completely different question :)</p>
<p>AP is more focused, while IB is more of a “liberal arts” education. AP better prepares you for college IMO. I’ve taken both AP and IB classes, and I’ve learned the most from AP.</p>
<p>Yes.</p>
<p>At least at my school, IB and AP classes are combined and AP students do the IB work anyway, so it’s a waste not going for the diploma.</p>
<p>Looking back there were a lot of late nights, but in the end it’s worth it.</p>
<p>I live in New Jersey and there are only 13 (I believe) high schools in the state that offer IB. If you’re looking for some kind of differentiator, however small, that’s it.</p>