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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Although there will alway be a certain level of difference with regard to teacher's scoring - the same can be said for all courses (AP as well), the IB program has rather strict guidelines/rubrics for each grade level (7 is the highest, with a 3+ failing) and it is hard for a teacher to bypass those guidelines. In addition, the kids are required to do projects throughout the program (world lit papers, science labs, etc) that are called IA's that are sent to the IB Organization for grading. Also, there are regular training courses that teachers must take in order to teach an IB course. With this oversight in place it makes it a bit difficult for teachers to give an easy grade. They won't last long before being told that they need to grade more appropriately. The bigger issue is whether a teacher is qualified to teach the material so that the kids are able to do the projects (papers, etc) that are required.

Also, I think it's absolutely correct that colleges/universities are looking for students who are in the most rigorous academic program that is available to them. In all of the university info sessions we have been to the admissions counselors highlighted the importance of students challenging themselves - take the most AP classes you are able to, enroll in the IB. Whatever is best at your particular school. If, however, your school offers 20 AP classes and the student only took 2 of them that would not be looked upon favorably - they would rather see a student who took as many and as varied a list of AP classes. College counselors have indicated to me that looking favorably on the IB diploma is because the student is required to take a full range of classes which covers all subject areas, whereas the AP doesn't have those requirements - students pick them and often only pick the ones they will do well in. In other words, if your child is in an AP program just make sure they are taking a wide range of courses and truly challenging themselves.[/quote]

The colleges and the kids all know which AP's are easier (think AP Environmental Sciences, aka APES, or AP Psychology) and which are killers (think AP Bio and other sciences, AP Calc BC and, surprisingly, AP Music). So if you're thinking of applying to a highly selective college, it won't do you much good to load up on APES and AP Calc AB and the like.

AP Lit and AP English involve a fair amount of writing. In DC's class they wrote timed essays in class once a week - say 15 or 30 minutes on a work they were reading.   There were also some longer projects. I believe this was done as preparation for the AP test.

If you're taking 3-4 APs in a school year, you pretty much have to diversify in order to take that many APs. At DC's competitive MoCo high school, the kids applying to selective colleges generally had 7-9 APs. I hear it's less at private schools, in some cases because the school just doesn't offer that many APs, in other cases because the school doesn't want to teach an AP curriculum.[/quote]

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