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Math SL IA, Due Earlier than Other Schools?


Miem

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So about how long do your teachers give you to work on the IA? My class started them around mid-early October. We turned in our first rough draft, emphasis on rough, last week and our teacher want them in this week as the copy she sends to IB, and she hasn't fully helped us or explained what else had to be done to fix them. Does this sound like the right timeline, or is she really cutting short our time? Any last minute tips?

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Teachers can only provide feedback on one draft of the IA, any IA. If you are not quite understanding what her comments were, you should refer to the same draft to ask her for clarification. The IA is meant to only take 10 hours of research time so a month is theoretically enough time. Because that you knew what the IA was, you could have started whenever. When revising, you should compare your work to the criteria. Don't hesitate to add or remove paragraphs at a time to ensure you are showcasing your best math abilities and maintaining good flow throughout the essay. 

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The IBO deadline for IAs and EEs are the same for all schools. However, different schools have different timelines for different reasons. In my opinion, especially when the deadline is much earlier than the IBO's, this hurts the students more than it helps. For example, my final EE draft deadline was a couple weeks ago, which doesn't make much sense when the real deadline is some time in late February or March. This resulted in everyone handing in subpar drafts that could have been much better -> potentially lowering our overall marks at the end. They're rationale was so we don't have to think about our EEs for much longer, which again, in my opinion, doesn't make sense as the EE deadline coincided with the start of my mocks -> RIP everything. 

It's really annoying, but it's up to the school, unfortunately. 

Edit: Felt like that was just ranting. If you're down to one week, just do a Statistics & Probability related IA where it would be much easier to obtain the required data, and then explore the Mathematics involved, which isn't very complicated in the first place, but would still be commensurate to the required level for SL explorations. Still, try to avoid Chi Squared or t-Tests if you can as they're Maths Studies level statistics. 

Edited by IB`ez
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Your teacher should give you more than a week for handing in your final draft after giving back your rough draft. I'm surprised by this. Generally, you need about the same amount of time to refine things. I would talk to your IB co-ordinator and ask if this can be adjusted.

Alternatively, you could just hand it in late. Yes, your math teacher might get cross but they have to accept it even if you hand it in late. There are no marks deducted by the IB for handing in something late. After all, if you do not hand in your IA you cannot get a mark for Math SL which has a cascading effect of not being rewarded your diploma. The actual deadline is in March so there's tons of time. I think your teacher wants to get it all marked during the Christmas break.

If I were you and thought that I needed more time, I would do the following:

1) Talk to your IB co-ordinator to negotiate an extension for the entire grade citing that more time is needed to polish the IA.

2) If the negotiation doesn't work then hand it in late (i.e. after the Christmas break but make sure you work on it during the break). There might be some consequences but your teachers and administrators will only put a strong front because they can't look weak. It's far worse for them if you don't hand it in at all.

Hope this helps.

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