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Any regrets about doing the IB?


Summer Glau

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Haha, well I used to be an IB student just destined for a whole bunch of certificates--I wasn't taking the full Diploma when I joined in Grade 11. I have an older brother who, when he was in IB, got 6s and 7s in literally everything, making the program look so easy. He's a 2nd year Neuroscience university student now. Having to live with him made me feel discouraged at stepping in the IB program; he set a standard so high I thought I could never achieve it.

I initially was a certificate student because my marks were never as high with his. But during my Grade 11 year, even with all of the promises of having a social life and less stress and so much free time, my averages weren't getting any higher. I looked at myself and asked myself, "what the heck is wrong with me?" so I talked to the IB coordinator about it. She scaled my marks to what IB would give me if I were a Diploma student, and suddenly discovered that I would have had unconditional acceptance into the field I wanted to pursue in the university of my choice. I was astounded! My brother (whom I initially kept my certificate status a secret) also shrugged and said that I had absolutely no benefits to being in "IB minus one" -- I had only dropped French. I was allowed to go back into being a Diploma student because the French course that I did in Grade 10 Pre-IB was a high enough level to count for my 1st year of IB that I missed in Grade 11.

In a way, I was actually advantaged--having the free time as a certificate student helped me complete my CAS hours in no time. Even with the "minus one" course, I was able to assess myself and really, it's not so bad. I've kinda cheated the IB system in this way but my coordinators say I'm all caught up as if I was always a Diploma student.

I'm in the middle of writing my EE now, and really, I have no regrets about doing the IB. In fact, the only regret I have is not being confident in myself in the first place. :P

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  • 1 month later...

I regret not learning proper time management and memory exercises and not paying attention until the first term was almost over. Right now I have twice the work since I'm doing what we're supposed to do, catching up what I should have done earlier and studying time management and study techniques and ways to improve your memory at the same time.

I don't reget starting the IB though, it was my only choice since the other education I could get here sucks and I've learned thinga that improves a lot more than just my studying. :P

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  • 4 weeks later...

IB...the workload is just too much!!

It puts you under tremendous pressure in meeting the coursework deadlines/internal assessments.

Maybe this is just my own problem...To be honest, I'm a slow worker :D

I'm already working much harder than before :P

Sometimes I think I may die of fatigue.

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Think of the IB as all of the mental conditioning for academics you'll ever need. I got my results today and it's in fact a very great feeling. I don't think anything at all went perfectly and I fought for every mark.

For those who tried their hardest, they got the most out of it. You can pick up self-organisation and time management skills that will be a great help in uni (or I hope) and success in future careers. You also learn how to drop everything when you're under time pressure and go for it. Something that I really picked up from this program is confidence, confidence in my future self to be able to tackle (almost) anything.

If you slack off, you're not going to get as much out of it. You take out of it what you put in. If you're not motivated to succeed, or don't want to succeed, don't do it.

The IB is far from easy. It is tough, it is awful, it is mentally draining, especially if you don't put the hard work in early enough. It is physically exhausting and it will make you feel at one of your lowest points, but what you gain and how you feel, your very self-satisfaction is the most rewarding.

I feel a heavy weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I do not regret doing the IB at all.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Like some of the other people here, I reckon that you will only realise the benefits of the IB when you are finished. You will also probably think that it wasn't so bad :) ...I know, weird right? But, like so many others, right now I'm feeling sick and tired of it all. I'm currently 2/3 of the way through IB, with my exams at the end of this year. So the worst isn't over yet by any means. I just hope this is going to be easier than people say...

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I do regret it sometimes. Specially when I see my friends who are graduating this year.

It's too late now anyway and I think I'm fine with it at the moment; I'm having an amazing experience for life.

... This is how I convince myself to do my CAS work.

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I would say the only thing I regret about IB is doing Biology HL rather than Chemistry HL, but otherwise IB has really improved my writing skills and time management. I deal with stress a lot better now and the converted grades are seriously amazing. But for sure, IB is not for everyone, because it is a lot of work and can get pretty stressful around exam time.

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I am annoyed about to be able to continue Music HL at my new school and kind of regret taking french as a substitute, but I really didn't have a choice. I am regretting not working that hard up to now, because I think I've made it difficult in the long run. I just hope it's worth all the stressing! Although I think I would still prefer doing IB to A levels, my only regret is going to a school that didn't offer music.

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  • 4 weeks later...

My biggest regret about IB is that I let myself get apathetic before my exams. It's not that they didn't matter to me, because they did (very much so). Its just that i don't think I placed enough emphasis on learning from the syllabus as opposed to past exams.

Overall, I am really glad I did IB. I came into college with a full year of General Education requirements under my belt and it taught me a lot about time management.

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Last year, I would never have said I regretted it, and I also (semi-jokingly) recommended it to all of the kids that I knew were in junior high.

However, that has all changed now. I am currently in IB hell with all of my internal/external assessment deadlines (the EE is due tomorrow), and I wouldn't wish this punishment on my most hated enemy (in fact, he dropped out of full IB last year). Only you (OP) will know if you made the right choice when you reach your last semester in 2012, but you better be at least 98.9% sure that you have an extremely solid work ethic, because this semester is killing me slowly.

On a side note, I never had a choice, because I was forced into full [french] IB by my parents. In my calculus class, almost exactly one year ago, a girl came in and told everybody not to go into full IB, because the month of February was hellish for her and the rest of the full IB kids. My friends and I laughed it off, but now I feel like crying, because her words were so true.

One more thing: the only bad part of full IB for me is the homework. CAS hours were easily completed over the summer (and I had a great time doing them), TOK class is fun and interesting, and even the HL classes can be enjoyable. There has never been a time when I was overwhelmed by the difficulty of the topics I was studying, but the sheer amount of homework is enough to kill a small animal (and is a threat to the sanity of a healthy high school student). I must stress that your work ethic must be amazingly strong to cope with all of the homework that you get in full IB.

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  • 8 months later...

I guess the only regret I have is that I wasn't really prepared for it. At my school people start planning schedules and taking pre-ib classes in 6th and 7th grade, but I moved to the school district late, having no idea what IB is, and joined my sophomore year not really knowing what I was getting myself into D:

Until then, I had never studied for anything in my life, so the workload was a shock to me, but now I love it.

I'm in my senior year now, and everything feels so easy, even though I have more work than I did last year.

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