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Can anyone provide some advice on the International Baccalaureate diploma?

How does the International Baccalaureate diploma compare to a diploma from a well known boarding school with respect to getting into selective eastern schools?

Thank you.

By Dave Berry on Sunday, December 30, 2001 - 09:07 am: Edit

Here's THE definitive information source for you, Tangle. For more info, just enter the phrse "IB diploma" into your favorite search engine (Google works best for me). Good luck!

By Mike Wise on Wednesday, February 27, 2002 - 01:16 pm: Edit

My son is graduating from an IB program. He was an early admit at U of Chicago and has been recruited by top schools with significant money being offered. I strongly feel that much of it is due to the IB program. His classmates are getting ED into many top school with SAT's that are OK but not great.
We are enrolling our younger son next year into the IB program out of our district. The graduates are doing as well as the local prep school with admission to top schools.

By Raptus regaliter on Wednesday, May 22, 2002 - 08:43 pm: Edit

Parents, do not enroll your students in the IB program. My friends and I are all diploma candidates, and we hate it. We spend all of our time studying and doing homework, sometimes for merely satisfactory. Let the children enjoy their childhoods! Thousands of students every year get into college without IB; stop worrying!

By NC IB Student on Wednesday, May 22, 2002 - 09:11 pm: Edit

Raptus, that may be true, and the truth is that it IS a lot of work and that IB is not for everyone. The rigid structure of the program does not make it advisable for people choosing to focus on specific areas. IB gives a more liberal arts oriented education. However, at my public school, IB has given us an edge up in college admissions. Before the IB program was instituted at my school, it was rare to send people to the Ivy Leagues and other selective schools. Last year, we sent 4 alone to Harvard; this year, several people will be attending colleges such as Swarthmore, Duke, Brown, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton, to name a few. All of our National Merit Semi-Finalists and Finalists were IB students. Our IB students amazingly find time to dedicate themselves to many different activities and still perform well in IB. Scholarship offers have been numerous and large. Many of my IB senior friends have been happy to have been admitted into their top choice schools (For example, Northwestern, Chicago, North Carolina-Chapel Hill) by Christmas time, taking away much of the stress of the Regular Decision. I believe that the IB diploma shows colleges that one indeed is capable of college-level work, and instead of AP, which is single-holistic (that is, focuses on one's strengths), IB forces you to concentrate on your weaknesses. I have never been that strong in French, but the IB program forces me to concentrate on improving my French, and this in turn helps me with the management of my other subjects and EC's. Hope this helps some.

By Hans Christian Rotmann on Monday, June 17, 2002 - 08:46 pm: Edit

I finished my IB Diploma program last year (by the way, I am a student from Lima, Peru, from one of the hardest and most competive high schools in South America - Markham College). I chose the four subjects at higher level (physics, chemistry, mathematics - which are the toughest - and english literature). I also did history and spanish literature. Although my grade was not that high (36 out of 45), y feel I have learnt a great lot thanks to the IB. I was rejected at MIT, Cornell and Caltech, nevertheless, but I know that the preparation I have recieved during my two years at the IB would have surely helped me in getting good results at these universities. I am going off to RIT this fall, and I feel that I will do positively.