Westerville School District Fortunate to get IB program
 

The International Baccalaureate (IB) diploma program headed for Westerville schools and based at Westerville South High School is a powerful opportunity for our children.

For those who may not know, the IB program is a demanding, two-year, college preparatory course of study that can be measured against similar courses around the world. It covers the academic basics but goes well beyond that and pushes a student toward critical thinking and independent study with a global view.

The program was originally devised in 1968 to provide a uniform educational curriculum for children of ambassadors, diplomats and military personnel who were always moving from one country to another. Because of the international flavor, it was designed to be on par with, and just as challenging, as any school curricula around the world.

An IB student's work is graded against the same set of criteria on which students in similar programs all over the world are graded. What that means is that our students will be measured against other students on a standardized scale recognized and respected by academic institutions around the world.

Here in the United States, the IB degree is recognized and accepted at more than 790 colleges and universities. These schools include Ivy League schools (Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, Princeton, etc.); state-sponsored schools in Ohio (Miami University, OSU, Ohio University, Ohio Northern, etc.); the University of California system (UCLA, UC-Berkeley, etc.) and hundreds more. Students with IB degrees are accepted at these institutions at a much higher rate than students with traditional high school degrees.

I've read a lot of misinformation written about this program recently and that's unfortunate. I would highly encourage anyone with an interest in the program or anyone who is critical of it to go to one of the informational sessions to hear the truth.

We are very lucky to be getting a program of this caliber, to be getting one more option that could give our kids a leg up out in the real world.

I, for one, am grateful to the teachers and administrators who have done the hard work to get the IB program to Westerville and am very excited that my son will be part of it.