International Baccalaureate

[Aurea]

Morning

I'd be grateful for any advice from people who have knowledge of IB.

We're thinking of taking our 12 year old son out of state school to move him to private. This is primarily because his maths ability is very ahead of his peers. He scored the top mark of 150 in his Midyis maths assessment and has already achieved silver certificate at UKMT INTERMEDIATE challenge (up to 4 years early).

We have a choice of two good private schools near us in Scotland, one of which studies for the IB. This one works much better logistically and looks amazing but I have concerns that the IB may be more
for all rounders (ability-wise). For A levels/Advanced Highers he is likely to excel at science/maths but the more varied curriculum may not suit him so well.

He's ambitious and wants to try for Oxbridge.

TIA

Aurea this previous thread may help and there will be others if you search.
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/2702450-a-levels-or-ib

Ask the IB school how many 7s they achieve for IB higher level maths. The priority is for your DS to be well taught in maths aiming for higher level and STEP as an extra plus two other STEM subjects. If the IB school can achieve this as well as the non IB school then there are longer term benefits to an education which continues developing English skills as well as a MFL.

DS's school is half IB and half A levels. I can remember being told at a number of information evenings that IB maths does not match well with STEP but I have no idea why not. Knowing that much I didn't want to not post but unfortunately I don't know enough about it to tell you anything constructive!

Quite a few maths teachers post on here and it may be worth opening a new thread in secondary education titled something specifically mathsy to attract them like "IB maths good for STEP or A levels better?". Alternatively you could pm a regular maths teacher poster like noblegiraffe who is always very helpful.
Sorry I'm not more use.

Do you have a better school nearby - a grammar perhaps?

Thanks all. I will have a more in depth look into the information

There is no grammar nearby as we live in Scotland. It's either private or mixed ability secondary.

A level Maths and Further Maths will cover some more advanced topics than the Higher level IB maths.

Ask school for destinations of their leavers, or it may be on their website. Do they have a solid record of sending students to Oxbridge? IB in itself is not a barrier. If you moved him now could you reconsider for 6th form, maybe boarding, if needs be.

My DDs did the IB at a private school in Scotland (east coast?). They were both all rounders. It's hard work but they both said it helped them be well prepared for uni. Neither were oxbridge candidates but did well enough to get into good unis. The school had quite number of students who got Oxbridge places.

I am an IB maths teacher.
If he is in Year 11 now he will be able to do IB further maths, which is a challenging course.
The information about STEP says they looked at IB when they prepared it and I know when I looked at it with a student who applied to Cambridge there was a good match.
The long term benefits of having studied IB can be seen at university.

Let me know if you have any more questions but it will be tomorrow when I reply.

The school for IB is The International School in Aberdeen. The other option is Robert Gordon. Do you have experience of either?

I'm not sure which year he would be classed in England, but he is in his first year of Secondary school in Scotland and is 12 going on 13. If we moved him, it would be the September after next which is when they start working towards their Nat 5s (GCSE equivalent)

Thanks!

Ah no. My DDs went to St Leonards in St Andrews.

My experience of IB is in International schools.
I misread your post and thought it said Year 12 not 12 year old. Sorry.
Does the school do MYP (Middle Years Programme - age 11 to 16) or just DP (Diploma Programme- age 16 to 18)?

They are changing DP and removing Further Maths. Less than 200 people a year took it out of 80 000, so it is not a surprise.

I'd be almost certainly be sending my DC to Robert Gordon's in your situation, I'm not sure why you prefer IB and the International school? If Further Maths is going from IB then that is a real loss but I'm not sure the international school did it anyway.
I would talk to both schools about how they would challenge and stretch your son.

Macropront, that explains why I wasn't aware that IB even offered further maths. DS's school is often the top performing IB school in the world and they struggle with higher level maths, I hate to think what further maths is like.

Further Maths is all four options from Higher Level plus Linear Algebra and Geometry. With good students it is fun to teach, I have two students this year and we have some amazing conversations about maths.