As they enter 11th grade, many North Atlanta High School students opt to enter the IB program. The IB Diploma Programme and the IB Career Programme begin in 11th grade. Whether they choose the Diploma Programme or the Career Programme, both face many challenges involving an increase in rigor and l looming IB deadlines. For these students, this is quite a change from their previous years of classes. Facing the struggles of time management, increased workloads, and higher expectations, their journey into IB will be quite the adjustment.
Time management is one of the most important aspects of being successful in the IB program. It has become so important that students are now required to have a planner, to keep track of assignments, and larger due dates such as their Creativity, Activity, and Service (CAS) hours, their Extended Essays (EE), and much more. Managing their completion of these assignments, as well as their regular classwork is a lot to keep track of. For many students in the past, time management and procrastination have been a struggle, and this has not proved differently for this year’s group of IB year 1 students. “I have always struggled with procrastination, and this year has brought on a whole new level of being pressed for time!” said junior, IB-CP student Riley Hutchison.
Another point of struggle has been the increase in workload. Although some students took AP classes as freshmen or sophomores, the IB workload is different. IB often includes more writing and analysis of the content, going deeper into topics, as well as a general increase in the amount of work itself. More work also has to be done outside of class, which many have found difficult to manage, tying into the aspect of struggle with time management for students. “The higher rigor and larger amounts of classwork and homework have made my transition to IB difficult.” Said junior and IB-DP student, Sydney Carter.
IB work is also graded on different scales and expectations than in previous school years. Many classes have certain rubrics based on the Internal Assessment (IA) expectations and general IB expectations for the class. These rubrics often impose higher expectations surrounding the quality of the work, and the amount of time and effort these assignments take. However, there is a lot of advice to go around to help the new IB students. Time-management skills such as planning and agendas, doing work on time, or limiting absences and tardies. These skills help students manage the amount of work and content they must learn, as well as make sure they do not miss important concepts in class. “There are many resources, websites, and guides that are always available to help students.” said IB Math AA teacher, Ms. Grant, “We all want the most success for our students.”
Entering into the IB program is a challenge that many students are willing to face. While time management, workloads, and rigor make these classes difficult, students have many teachers and students willing to help them out and bring the best out of them through the IB program.
