- Gray's Woods Elementary
- Gray's Woods Elementary School
International Baccalaureate Programme candidate
Attending an International Baccalaureate Programme school opened Masha Staub’s eyes to her academic potential.
Before she spent a year in Berlin, Germany during her mother’s sabbatical, the State High senior often had difficulty focusing and remembering details in her classes. But she excelled at the Nelson Mandela School once she adjusted to the curriculum’s reflective approach and its emphasis on making real-life connections and collaborating with classmates through group work.
“When I went over to IB and they wanted collaboration, they wanted you talking more, I got a lot more confident as a person, which has helped me a lot this year,” Staub said.
The State College Area High School has been approved as a candidate school for two optional high school International Baccalaureate Programmes: The IB Diploma Programme and the IB Career-related Programme.
If authorized by International Baccalaureate, both programmes would be options for grades 11-12. By April 1, 2018, the district plans to apply to IB for authorization for the 2019-2020 school year.
International Baccalaureate is an global nonprofit foundation whose academic curriculum is taught in hundreds of schools. According to International Baccalaureate, an IB education is defined by four characteristics: centering on learners, developing effective approaches to teaching and learning, working within global contexts and exploring significant content.
“It’s very student-centered, particularly with core components where students get to develop their own creative project or community service project,” said State High IB Diploma Programme Coordinator-Designee Jennifer Schreiber. “There are a lot of student-initiated pieces where teachers are there to support it but not drive it.”
The programmes
Under the IB Diploma Programme, students take at least six courses during their junior and senior years from six curriculum groups — Language and Literature, Language Acquisition, Individuals and Societies, Sciences, Mathematics, and Art. Selections must come from all the groups. Some courses are divided into standard and high (two years) levels.
State High’s initial offerings will be Literature and Language; Language Acquisition B for students with at least two to three years experience in French, German, Latin and Spanish; Business and Management; Economics; History; World Religions; Physics; Environmental Systems and Societies; Sports, Exercise and Health Science; Mathematics (Applied); Mathematics (Theoretical); Music; Film; and Visual Arts.
Courses are graded from 1 to a top score of 7; diplomas require a minimum of 24 points. Students also must complete an interdisciplinary Theory of Knowledge course that explores ways of thinking, drawing from the six curriculum groups and capped by a 1,600 word essay. In addition, a 4,000 word extended essay on a topic of choice and an individualized creativity or service project are required— each worth one point toward a diploma.
“I think that one of the main advantages to the programme, to attempting the full diploma, would be the interconnectedness of the programme and the core components, which really tie everything together and build the student as a researcher and as a self-directed learner,” Schreiber said.
The IB Career-related Programme comprises four core components — professional and personal skills, language development, a service learning project, and a reflective project exploring an ethical dilemma in a career studies area — as well as a chosen Career and Technical Center pathway and two IB Diploma Programme courses.
Shelly Ishler, the IB Career-related Programme Coordinator-Designee, said the programme aims to teach personal development, intercultural understanding, effective communication, thinking processes and applied ethics. Like the IB Diploma Programme, the career-related path offers a curriculum that seeks to foster connections and promote deeper thinking as well as teach in-depth material, Ishler said.
“When schools see an IB course on a transcript, their ears go up,” Ishler said. “They think, ‘This kid is really pushing himself or herself beyond what’s expected.’ ”
Though the amount varies depending on schools, IB students can earn college credit from their high school courses. While Advanced Placement classes also provide this — and State High has many choices — Schreiber said IB courses differ by measuring learning at various points in addition to a final test, and from being less content-driven and more holistic.
As a prime example of IB’s approach, Schreiber pointed to the Theory of Knowledge course
which links to every content area and explores how we understand the world around us.
“It’s not about being right or wrong,” she said. “It’s about developing your thinking and supporting what you know with how you know it, and how we know it to be true.”
The experience
Back in Berlin, Staub started off her IB year with a shock — a very low test score.
It took some adjusting at first. For one thing, she had to ramp up her study habits.
“You couldn’t study the night before the test and get away with it,” she said. “When I had a math test … I was studying two weeks in advance because you just had to make sure you actually knew everything you had learned in class.”
Over time, she also acclimated to the constant encouragement to connect material to real life, the emphasis on multiple thought processes, and the frequency of group work, such as in her math class.
“Everybody has different strengths,” she said. “I’m a lot better with theory; I can connect things well. I had a friend, she was very detailed. She remembered what every little equation could do. So we worked very well together because we had strengths that played off each other.”
This year, she said, teachers have asked her if IB is only for “top tier” students. She doesn’t think that’s true.
“If you are interested in learning, if you are interested in challenges and challenging yourself, then you should be interested in IB,” she said. “You don’t necessarily have to be in that top tier. I think it’s just your attitude toward learning.”
Despite her rocky beginning, she soon excelled in her economics, math, physics, chemistry, English and German courses, building confidence that continues to propel her today.
“It’s really like believing in myself,” she said. “When I’m applying for colleges, I’m going bigger and I’m saying I can do this. I fit. I’m a smart person, I love a challenge, I work hard. I should be admitted there.”
More information about IB Programmes is available on the SCASD International Baccalaureate webpage. For questions about State High’s potential choices, please contact Jennifer Schreiber at jls17@scasd.org and Shelly Ishler at sji11@scasd.org.
Video by Nabil K. Mark