Reply to BCC IB - Acceptances to Canadian and UK Universities?

Forum Index » Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS)

Reply to "BCC IB - Acceptances to Canadian and UK Universities?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]100% agree that IB has great capacity to prep students for university.  Full diploma holder here so maybe I'm biased but friends in school counseling agree.  I don't think AP is bad or without its own benefits, but I agree that IB is better at prepping students, particularly if they plan on going into humanities, social sciences, law etc. (i.e. will be writing a lot in university).

Re applications - we are also going through this precise question right now although our interest is solely in Canada, so this response is going to make me sound like a secret IB booster, but it's really just that all of this is top of mind for us as well.  It's not particularly common for people in DC to target Canadian universities--and definitely not beyond Toronto, McGill, and UBC--so it is difficult to develop any reliable sense of whether IB courses make a difference or not.  There was a recent publication of college acceptances for students in public high schools in the Bethesda area, and it seemed to suggest that IB helps (Bethesda-Chevy Chase high school had, I think, a somewhat outsized number of offers compared to other area high schools), but the numbers are low enough that it's really hard to say either way, plus there could be other contributing factors (such as that Bethesda-Chevy Chase is probably the most urban of the high schools included in that survey, and maybe urban dwellers are more likely to have kids interested in heading off to Toronto or Montreal or Vancouver, or that are interested in getting out of the U.S.).

If you want IB, your best options will be (in no particular order) (1) Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School in Bethesda (Maryland), (2) Meridian High School in Falls Church City (Virginia), (3) Washington International School (private in DC, $$$$), or (4) British International School of Washington (private in DC, $$).  If you are really, really keen on UK, at BISW they do GSCEs as well as the IB exams.  There are other schools in DC that offer IB but...not very well.  I think the above 4 are the key options.  Depending on your budget and neighborhood preferences, Albert Einstein in Maryland also offers the diploma program.

One other thing to be aware of - as much as I'm glad I did the full diploma, I'm not sure my kid will want to, so I've found it important that she have access to IB courses without committing to the full diploma.  I know Bethesda-Chevy Chase offers course access without full diploma commitment but haven't yet looked at the others. Just something to consider.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics