Comments on: What the Heck is “IB”?

By: DecaturTeach

DecaturTeach — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 19:20:38 +0000

Tom Stubbs wrote:
All’s I know is that the IB program took one of the high school’s most talented teachers, a chemistry teacher, offline as a teacher so he could help other teachers implement IB. I have to admit that the administrative overhead additions of late– the Renfroe principal and now this — make me nervous.

Clarification…
There is an Instructional Coach position at all the schools. The position at DHS that the chemistry teacher is filling is not a new position or “overhead addition”. The instructional coach who was at DHS moved to a position at the Georgia DOE.

By: teach

teach — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 03:53:52 +0000

Hey teach- I’m teach. Would you please use a slightly different name?

By: karass

karass — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 02:22:51 +0000

At least some of the teachers are very sold on IB, evidently to the point that we’re told that they are hurt if anyone challenges IB or the 4/5 Academy concepts. That impresses me. However, as a parent, I never see anything tangibly different. Can’t tell if that’s a curriculum or communication issue. In addition, it seems like gifted services and services for learning disabilities are completely disconnected from IB and are more about MAP and CRCT and other testing. So it’s all feels disjointed and confusing. So far, if resources are dwindling, I still vote for putting resources into keeping class sizes at current levels or smaller and putting more paraprofessional support into the elementary school classrooms (and I mean INTO the classrooms, not providing clerical support for the school office) rather than into new curricula or teaching approaches. No matter what curricula are used, students benefit from reasonably sized classes and sufficient teacher support. Without those, any curriculum is hard to implement.

But I’m also open to data and what experience Decatur has with IB. At the junior/senior high school level, I too worry about an IB diploma that only benefits a tiny proportion of students. If having the diploma option really has spillover benefits for all students, those benefits should be defined, measured, and documented.

By: Teach

Teach — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 00:01:08 +0000

website for IB is
http://www.ibo.org/

By: Andrea

Andrea — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 17:59:39 +0000

The CSD has a video on IB at Glennwood Academy and Renfroe and Expeditionary Learning at the elementary school level that explains these curriculum connections. It was the spotlight at a CSD board meeting last fall. You can see the video in the Vdieo Gallery on the CSD website at http://www.csdecatur.net/video