Halcyon IB School

[BizzyBuzz]

Has anyone had any experience with this school? Also interested in hearing your thoughts about the IB curriculum.

I'd also like to hear any experiences people have.

Are you talking about MYP (years 7 to 11) or DP (years 12 and 13)?

I taught IB DP Maths, wad CAS coordinator and was part of the 2 man team that got our school it's IB status. Unless my child was showing very early signs of being the new Einstein, I wouldn't put them through the DP. PYP and MYP yes. DP, no. It's too much.

Ds1 did the IB diploma - he (mostly) enjoyed it and ended up doing very well but he is a true all-rounder who'd been finding it very difficult to narrow down subjects for A-levels - his school did both

The CAS element wasn't too onerous (and the volunteering element has helped him get summer jobs) and writing the extended essay was good practice for university

Ds2 is just about to start sixth form and is very much a STEM student- it would be torture for him to carry on with English and a MFL for any longer than was absolutely essential so he is definitely doing A-levels

I'd want him to finish the last three years at the school, including taking the IB diploma.

(For what it's worth, we're American and the idea of narrowing down to 3 subjects for the last years remains very odd to me; I did the full breadth of subjects to 18, as all my classmates did.)

I did the IB Diploma - slightly diffferent as I was at an international school and its just what you did as A levels werent an option.

3 highers, 3 subsidiary levels, CAS (200 hours) and Theory of Knowledge.

Quite a few people didn't acheive the full diploma but did get individual certificates in each subjet. It's a good grounding, but I think you need to be academic. The diploma is (or was, I'm not sure now, this was a while ago), was worth more UCAS points. I started my degree in Scotland in second year and skipped the foundation year.