On April 12, 2016, Clarke Central High School then sophomore Peyton Lowery presented her International Baccalaureate (IB) personal project. The Clarke County School District no longer offers the IB Programme, according to an email sent out on July 12. Photo by Julie Alpaugh
According to an email sent to Clarke County School District students and parents, the International Baccalaureate (IB) Programme will no longer be offered by the district.
In an email sent to Clarke County School District students and parents on July 12, it was stated that the CCSD will no longer offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) Programme.
The IB Programme was launched in the CCSD in 2011 and aims to “develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect,” according to the program’s mission statement.
According to the email, a task force assembled to examine the CCSD’s implementation of the IB Programme found both strengths and weaknesses of the program. A parent serving on a Local School Governance Team, teachers, instructional coaches, IB coordinators, and administrators from secondary schools made up the task force.
According to the task force’s report, strengths of the program included “student-centered project-based learning opportunities and lesson/unit planning for teachers. The weaknesses were “lack of teacher training and organizational structures (i.e. scheduling, transition across school levels, implementation benchmarks).”
“Based on these findings, the Clarke County School District will no longer offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) Programme,” the email stated. “The task force that conducted the review concluded the IB Programme’s required processes and structures do not align well with the CCSD’s mission and structures. They also found that it did not meet the needs of all of our students.”
CCHS junior Maggie DeMaria, who completed an IB personal project last school year, feels she benefited from the program. DeMaria’s project was on ankle prosthetics.
“At first, (the personal project) was incredibly daunting, and throughout the process, it was challenging coordinating between IB requirements and school requirements, but I loved what I did,” DeMaria said. “The IB Personal Project was a rollercoaster, but redesigning an ankle prosthetic reinforced the idea that I want to pursue a career path in Bioengineering/Prosthetics.”
DeMaria has mixed feelings about the program’s termination.
“IB is a great program that has reinforced lots of great ideals and learning skills into my education but at times it was more harmful than (helpful),” DeMaria said. “For example, the IB Project was incredibly stressful and time consuming but it had a great final product. I think that maybe, had the program been executed and enforced in a different way, it could’ve been more successful and a better fit for our district.”
CCHS junior Zumar Alam, who also completed his personal project, feels that the specifications of the CCSD being an IB district were vague to students.
“To be honest, in the beginning, I didn’t really know much about IB or what the point of it was. I wasn’t until I actually did the project last year where I understood the learner profiles and how to apply them in my life, like in my case it was cooking and I applied risk taking and thinking,” Alam said. “It’s sad to see IB go, considering the fact that I just began to understand it.”
CCHS math Department Chair Heather Julian agrees with the decision to stop offering the IB Programme in the CCSD.
“I am glad that we are no longer offering the IB programme in CCSD because it took my energy from some of the other aspects of teaching that I value,” Julian said. “The IB tasks were great but were ‘one more thing’ that I had to schedule in addition to regular assessments. Although the IB Programme has a lot of positive attributes, the lack of the diploma program diminished the impact of the program for our students.”
The email sent to students and parents also states that “the district remains committed to providing rich learning experiences that promote inquiry, problem-solving, critical-thinking and real-world connections for each child in our district.”
