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The International Baccalaureate Diploma is an increasingly popular post-sixteen qualification, now available at well over 100 independent and state schools in the U.K.

The IB offers prescribed breadth, not the ‘pick and mix’ choice which emerged from the Curriculum 2000 reforms to A Level, so that all IB diploma students study six subjects; three at Higher Level and three at Standard Level. These must include the student’s own first language, a foreign language, a science, a humanity and mathematics. The sixth subject may be a second foreign language, a second science, a second humanity or an elective such as music, art or computer science. Study in these six areas is united by all students studying “Theory of Knowledge” (a course in critical thinking, essentially) and assessment of a 4,000 word extended essay on a topic of their choice.

Over the two years of the course students must also complete a log of a personal programme of activities covering Creativity, Action and Service or CAS (the third element, along with ToK and the Extended Essay, to make up the Diploma’s ‘core’). This recognises the value of the diverse range of activities and experiences to be found in all BSA boarding schools, and that education should not be confined to the classroom. All Diploma students have to complete fifty hours of creative work, of action (sport), and of service to the local or wider community.

The IB Diploma has a coherence and balance, as well as breadth which educationalists and universities applaud. That said, the IB is an unashamedly academic and rigorous qualification, as acknowledged in the recent inclusion of the IB Diploma in the UCAS tariff which equates six A Levels at grade A to 43 out of a possible 45 IB points.

The Diploma is recognised for entry at Universities throughout the world including, of course, all those in the UK.

Hockerill Anglo-European College:

Hockerill Anglo-European College, a state boarding school in Bishop’s Stortford has offered the IB Diploma as its only post 16 provision since 1998. It also models its pre 16 curriculum on the IB Middle Years programme. The international outlook of the IB, its coherence, balance and its recognition of the importance of the development of the whole person provides an ideal match for the College’s own mission and vision.

Dr Robert Guthrie
Principal
Hockerill Anglo-European College

Sevenoaks School:

As we know, a growing number of independent schools have recently adopted the IB and are running it alongside A Levels. Sevenoaks, however, has been offering the IB for thirty years and has ditched A Levels altogether: In September 2006 it became the first HMC school in the UK to have an all-IB Diploma sixth form, of over 400. Why did the school choose to break completely from the national system?

The answer lies mainly in the growing recognition by all stakeholders – parents, students, governors and staff – that the IB Diploma, as well as being underpinned by a worthy educational philosophy, offers an academic qualification second to none.

One of the keys to the IB’s success must lie in the fact that it is an organisation quite independent of government and therefore free from the political influence that has bedevilled our national qualifications’ system in recent years. Perhaps that explains why the IB has not been subject to the phenomenon of ‘grade inflation’, and its popularity with universities both in this country and abroad.

However, at Sevenoaks we not only believe in the IB's mission, which infuses all aspects of the school’s life, but see it as a valuable passport to the world of work, as well as higher education. Employers must be attracted to bilingual applicants who are both literate and numerate. And, as the IB continues to boom across the globe, it seems that other countries recognise a post-sixteen curriculum which embraces coherence, balance, breadth, rigour, compassion and a commitment to ‘lifelong’ learning is vital for their economic prosperity as well as general well-being.

Mr Graham Lacey
Deputy Head Academic
Sevenoaks School