IB Learner Profile - What do you make of it?

[Guest syrianstar]

Hey everyone, I hope you're doing good and I hope all 2008 graduates are revising well and are super ready for their exams

I made this topic to know more about what other IB students think about the Learner Profile; do you think it is a good classification of IB Students? Do you aspire to be a person with all those characteristics once you graduate from IB? Or do you think that it is almost a form of brainwashing, where the IBO is trying to turn us into zombies, who are 'caring', 'knowledgable' and 'reflective'. Ok maybe not that dramatic but my point is made.

Personally I do aspire to acquire all those characterisitics one day, but I don't like the way it is made as if IB Learners are different from others because of these 'special' features of character. Also I absolutley HATE the fact that my school has a whole project about it, to the extent that they made us make a video just like the one by the IBO, and display boards to hang around the school

Our teachers have a thing where if they catch us out of line, they will point to the IB Learner profile (incidentally hung up in every IB classroom) and say 'so you call yourself independant learners do you?! HA! Some IB students you are!'

So what do you think? Looking forward to reading your comments

Spoiler - Click me!

For those who have forgotton /or have wisely decided not to waste much needed brain cells over memorising the Learner Profile, here it is:

IB Learners Are (drumroll)

Inquirers

Thinkers

Communicators

Risk Takers

Knowledgable

Balanced

Caring

Open minded

Reflective

aaand Principled

[Close]

Edited April 30, 2008 by syrianstar

[__inthemaking]

Wow, I can't believe your school has posters about it and made you guys make a video..that would be so annoying :\. To be honest, I've only seen that vid once and don't entirely remember it lol. It's just a brainwashing technique aimed at parents to make them believe that their children will be superior if they join IB, really lol.

[IBMan9000]

I have never heard of the IB learner's profile before this thread, but it is very degrading to non-IB students that go to the same school. At our school, there's some unspoken (and undeserved ) tension between non-IB faculty and the IB faculty for some reason. Whenever a non-IB faculty member gives an announcement they always talk about IB like we're perfect little genius angels. The concept of us being normal to them is completely foreign. I can see how promoting something like the Learner Profile would increase that tension and also put more pressure on the IB kids and the non-IB kids.

I guess we should get used to this type of "Learner Profile" thing, I see posters that promote similar gimmicky ways to motivate people in my father's office all the time. The funniest one is a meter that goes up to 10 with a handwritten 11 on the side of it and the needle is pointing to the 11. If anyone gets motivated by a handwritten 11 on a meter I think it's time they reexamine their life.

[Bandev]

The IB learner profile is a joke; all rhetoric.

The one I object to most is balanced, some people come out of IB so defeated.

Edited May 6, 2008 by Bandev

[BBiswatching]

Ahaha, the IB Learner Profile...

This year, my IBC got huge posters made of the Profile and had them all hung up in each of the IB classrooms. Nobody pays any attention to them.

My sister applied to my school's IB Program this year: Our IBC changed to application to "Choose 2 of the characteristics from the IB Learner Profile and write an essay on how they apply to you" or something along those lines.

Basically, while I think the idea of the Profile is quaint, it seems to also discourage what I feel is the very characteristic of IB that differentiates it from AP and all those other programs out there - individuality. It probably sounds a bit cheesy, but what I like the most about the IB, at least at my school, anyhow, is that we're more encouraged to develop our own opinions and ideas, rather than get redundant facts shoved down our throat and then be expected to vomit those facts back up for tests. While it'd be nice for all IB students to be reflective, balanced, caring, thinkers, etc., it would take away a lot of the angular personalities that makes discussions in class interesting.

At our school, there's some unspoken (and undeserved ) tension between non-IB faculty and the IB faculty for some reason. Whenever a non-IB faculty member gives an announcement they always talk about IB like we're perfect little genius angels. The concept of us being normal to them is completely foreign.

We have that at my school too! All the non-IB faculty seem to think the IB teachers have it so easy because they teach a bunch of well-behaved kids who are willing and ready to learn. And non-IB students think we (IBers) get special treatment from school administration *snorts* If anything, we get harsher treatment from administrators and secretaries because they seem to assume that just because we're in IB we'll automatically try to pull an elitist-attitude on them or something. It's really irritating getting yelled at by counseling office secretaries when you try to nicely remind them to mail your college application or something, and they yell "Oh, you IB kids! You think you're better than everyone else don't you?!? Well, I'll have you know I went to college too!!"

[Mr. Shiver]

I think it's kind of silly to try and create some sort of recipe of qualities that will supposedly guarantee success. Especially since we all the know the real qualities of successful IB students are more like "they BS", "they steal copyrighted material", "they procrastinate", "they procrastinate some more by stealing more copyrighted material", and "they drive their teachers insane". But maybe that's just me.

[Ashika]

I think it's kind of silly to try and create some sort of recipe of qualities that will supposedly guarantee success. Especially since we all the know the real qualities of successful IB students are more like "they BS", "they steal copyrighted material", "they procrastinate", "they procrastinate some more by stealing more copyrighted material", and "they drive their teachers insane". But maybe that's just me.

I don't agree with the stealing copyrighted material.

IB has given me the fear of plagiarism and I think it has taught us NOT to do that.

Procrastination and BS-ing is very true though.

[Mr. Shiver]

Oh haha, I didn't mean plagiarism, I meant downloading past papers and markschemes and whatever else the truly successful IB students grab.

Edited May 23, 2008 by Mr. Shiver

[Silviana]

Haha, yeah, I think the IB learner profile is unnecessary... besides, all of those qualities are ones that normal humans SHOULD have, anyway- open-minded, principled, communicators etc...

Yeah, at my school, there's sooooo much tension between IBers and non-IBers- a non-IBer will say: "I'm so stressed! My exam's tomorrow and I haven't finished writing up my cheat sheet..." And then an IBer will be like: "AS IF YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO COMPLAIN! We don't even get cheat sheets..."

lol

[Forester]

I find the learner profiles pretty good. Although it does not reflect fully the qualities of a typical IB student, I think we can all strive towards it. This is rather surprising coming from a pessimist such as myself.

[deissi]

Oh haha, I didn't mean plagiarism, I meant downloading past papers and markschemes and whatever else the truly successful IB students grab.

It's not illegal/forbidden to acquire past papers, but it is copyright infringement to share them in public.

Anyways, about the IB learner propa..profile, it's full of scheisse as they'd say in Germany. I especially find the part about risk-taking to be funny since IB teaches us not to take any risks in plagiarizing

[blindpet]

Oh haha, I didn't mean plagiarism, I meant downloading past papers and markschemes and whatever else the truly successful IB students grab.

You are absolutely right, I'm going to go on a short rant about the hypocrisy of the IBO which claims cultural diversity and equal opportunity to the global population. Here are a few calculations for what I used to succeed at IB and what it would have cost if I had paid for it - I didn't.

Questionbanks for each subject (assuming they exist): 80 x 6 = 480

Subject reports for each subject 6 years back for May and Nov sessions: (1.50 x 6) x 12 = 108

Extended Essay and ToK subject reports for the last 6 years: 22 x 6 = 132

Teacher Support Material for each subject: 12 x 6 = 72

And that isn't everything! Include books that your school doesn't provide, Microsoft Office 2007 for nice preparation of documents etc and it becomes easily over 1000 GBP. I am not ashamed of not paying, nor do I feel I should have to pay such an astronomical amount of money for basic materials. Of course if I had the money I would have but I didn't. I thank god that I could find these things on the internet in different places (that the IBO always takes down upon discovery) so that I could achieve my goals.

792 GBP, isn't that insane? Yes our teachers are supposed to have all of these materials and pass on the golden information, but how often do they? I find it incredibly disappointing and despicable that the IBO requires you to spend a **** load of money on their resources if you want to have a somewhat well-functioning IB School. It is also incredibly shocking that there is no OCC (online curriculum centre) for STUDENTS. That type of forum would help IB students around the world communicate and get cultural interaction which is what the IBO claims it wants for the world. So, where's the initiative to promote this? It is also supposed to make an IB school in developing countries possible, but the way I see it it is only the elite in developing countries who will be able to have the materials necessary for IB success

Why don't Subject Reports for students exist? Why don't Student Support Materials exist for IAs along with Teacher Support Materials for every subject? Is it me or is the IBO administration incredibly inefficient (econ/bus peeps) and more interested in spreading the IB programme than taking steps to ensuring that it is done properly and effectively instead of spreading like some uncontrolled plague?

Do not get me wrong, I like the IB programme and what I have gotten out of it. What I do not appreciate is how arduous it was and how much extra work I had to do - it shouldn't be like this, should it?

Luckily we are Inquirers, Thinkers, Communicators (thx to the internet), Risk Takers (especially), Knowledgeable (very) and extremely Caring; otherwise this forum would not exist with all of the awesome resources. We should all thank Innovators (why isn't this on the list?) like Deus and the mods for creating a place where IB students can help and support each other - since the IBO doesn't seem to be too concerned with student welfare.

Edited May 26, 2008 by blindpet

[Mr. Shiver]

Questionbanks for each subject (assuming they exist): 80 x 6 = 480

Subject reports for each subject 6 years back for May and Nov sessions: (1.50 x 6) x 12 = 108

Extended Essay and ToK subject reports for the last 6 years: 22 x 6 = 132

Teacher Support Material for each subject: 12 x 6 = 7

I love how the guides are presumably available for free on the OCC, and for anyone who wants a guide and doesn't have access to the OCC has to pay around US$30 in IB's ideal little world.

IB is a ripoff. All hail the mighty Deus.

[Graeme]

Haha Mr. Shiver. No one has to hail me. One of the things I love about this place is that all I had to do was set it up and add some initial content. Since then I haven't really done much except keep the site up to date and running. It's all the contributors that have made this site what it is today.

So if you want to hail anyone, it should be all the people who have contributed to the site.

[Mr. Shiver]

Yeah, but by putting those guides up, you've theoretically saved us students about US$1000.