Reply to NOVA Stats for spring '17 UVA, W & M & Tech acceptances (or not)

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Reply to "NOVA Stats for spring '17 UVA, W & M & Tech acceptances (or not)"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Let's see some real data on IB costs - there's a lot of assertion here but only one poster brought any real data.  The IB coordinator also teaches at our school.

The argument that only 10% of students who take IB classes get a diploma misses the point - 0% of students who take AP classes get an AP diploma.  Students can take individual IB courses (and get a normal FCPS diploma the same as the AP students).  Relatively few take on the additional requirements to qualify for the IB diploma.

My understanding is that the IB curriculum was instituted to draw students into lower SES schools and impart a "halo effect" that might be beneficial to the school as a whole.  I don't know how that worked out although our school GCMarshall has been very successful with the IB program and has maybe 50 students who pupil place in for the program each year.  We pupil placed out of Madison (an AP school) and into the IB program at GCM.  It was a very challenging program but we were generally happy with the experience.  I don't know how much of GCM's recent success has to do with development in the area and other demographic factors and with the IB program.  They also have a top notch principal.[/quote]

I would submit you are the one missing the point. While no students may receive an "AP diploma," substantially more than 20% of the students at AP schools take significant numbers of AP courses, are viewed favorably by college admissions officers, and the rest are not stigmatized because they don't fall in the "IB diploma" category.  If you question that analysis, you really owe the rest of us an explanation as to why the six top-ranked high schools in FCPS are all AP, and parents at those schools show no interest in converting them to IB. In fact, when FCPS tried to convert Woodson to IB, the parents forced the School Board to reverse the decision.

As for Marshall, the improvement in its reputation is due to the growth of Tysons and demand for nearby housing. Even so, the home prices go up substantially as soon as you cross from the Marshall district to the Madison or McLean HS districts.  If IB really were so attractive, one might expect the opposite in a county where parents care as deeply about their children's education as Fairfax.

Again, FCPS would be better off with one or two IB programs, not eight under-subscribed programs whose main appeal at present is the fact that they give parents in certain lower-performing schools an option to pupil place to a higher performing AP school (at least until the AP school is closed to transfers).[/quote]

What makes you think that parents know anything about AP vs IB? Most have no idea. They reject IB because they don't know what it is and they remember taking AP classes themselves. The fact that some group of parents is opposed to IB is not sufficient evidence to decide that IB must be bad. So I question *your * analysis, if that's what your conclusion is based on.

Do you have any evidence to support your assertion that students who take IB classes but don't pursue the diploma are not viewed favorably by college admissions officers and are "stigmatized" in some way?[/quote]

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