The IB exams are now over for another year. While our IB learners spend two years working toward these culminating examinations, the process of being an IB learner develops so many valuable skills. The core IB Junior learners have started working on their Extended Essay, which is an individual research project developed around an interest of the learner’s. This year the topics include a comparison of global incarceration systems and explorations in astrophysics among others.
The skills that learners develop in this process are so useful for life and for college; they learn to research, to investigate, to develop knowledge and to articulate their findings in an academic register. They learn the invaluable skill of identifying when sources are reliable, and when they can be jettisoned. With so much information out there online, this skill is one of the skills that I most value as a parent and as an educator. In previous years, IB learners have often written to me from college saying how glad that they were to have done the Extended Essay because their non-IB peers struggled to research and write academically.
Hearty congratulations to all of the senior learners who took one or more IB examinations. It is a real accomplishment.
Abbie Neall
IB Diploma Coordinator