Would you send your child to an IB secondary school?

[Cortina]

Think the National Curriculum is then not relevant?

A different 'system'? More child led learning?

More creative approach? More interesting approach? Broader approach?

Well I chose not but it was more because the school was a language specialist and I felt that the emphasis on languages meant that other areas of the curriculum were weaker. The school has moved on now and addressed the weaker areas but I do think the broader approach has some disadvantages in that children who went there ended up with a large number of short course GCSEs. This is fine if you take the IB into sixth form but makes it difficult to swop to A levels.

I'm afraid I'm a bit more of a traditionalist and want straight english, maths, science etc having "Human Ingenuity" as a curriculum area is not really my cup of tea

Yes - we are looking at one for DD. We are partly anticipating the possibility that she may want to do tertiary education overseas. But also because I like the system better.

We chose not to because we felt that ds was more of an exam boy and the lengthy dissertatiosn would not suit him. However, as he is only 11, this may change as he matures, so we have an open mind regarding what happens after GCSE, and he may at that stage go to an IB school, or sixth-form college.

ds goes to an International school where I/GCSEs are offered at KS4, and then a choice of A levels or IB at KS5. The problem for me with IB is that you have to be good at all curriculum areas to get the points for Uni, and this will not suit all students. I would not have coped with IB as maths and science are a closed book to me, and humanities/languages are my bag. I did humanities and languages at A level as I knew those were the areas I wanted to study