Reply to Robinson dumping AP classes and focusing on IB

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Reply to "Robinson dumping AP classes and focusing on IB"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Regardless of how Robinson ended up with IB in the first place, it would make sense to reassess current community preferences (and regardless of whether a particular IB teacher or parent at Robinson would like to maintain the status quo and/or eliminate AP courses there).  We already know that we pay more for IB because the IBO requires dedicated resources at each school that offers the IB diploma. [/quote]

Why?  Do we poll the community on school start time, class sizes, lunch offerings, elective options, or after school offerings?  No.  Can you imagine the mess if every few years they had to poll parents and then change course offerings based on what was popular with that particular crowd?

Look, I'm not an IB fan (i think it's way too much work for math teachers to grade 20 page papers on top of teaching advanced concepts) but the thought of changing programs because this year's families don't like it seems ridiculous.  There are AP options within 5 minutes from Robinson.[/quote]

If they were intending to eliminate lunch offerings or electives, it would make perfect sense to solicit input from students and their families.  [b]Likewise, if they are now undertaking to curtail the number of AP courses, including in some core areas,[/b] it would be an opportune time to find out whether the community would prefer more AP and less IB.

Any good organization tries to figure out what is working well and what is not working well, and any good business tries to assess why it might be losing market share.  FCPS strenuously resists any such outreach, except when it can ignore the results.  They never want to admit what they once thought might be preferable no longer is preferable, much less that they may have made a mistake in the first place.  But the fact that FCPS stopped dead in its tracks by the mid-00s in terms of converting AP schools to IB, after an initial spate of conversations in the late 90s and early 00s, suggests they already know the county over-invested in IB. [/quote]

They are dropping ONE out of FOUR AP classes.  This isn't a full AP program getting sliced to 2 courses.  They have never had many AP classes.  ONE class is going away because it has an identical IB offering.  No one is changing the whole landscape at Robinson.[/quote]

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