An International Diploma for the 21st Century

As the school year gets underway at Cheshire Academy, 11 juniors are taking courses through the school's International Baccalaureate Diploma program. Dozens more are taking IB courses as part of their wider studies. The two-year course of study is being offered for the first time at the school.

The diploma program requires students to take six subject courses that extend through junior and senior year.

To earn the diploma, students must take three courses at an advanced level and three at the "standard level," write a 4,000-word essay, and fulfill a service requirement.

Laura Longacre, a French teacher and IB Diploma Programme coordinator for the school, said the courses are geared toward the “A-B student” or an “A-B student who gets an occasional "C,” who has a strong work ethic and "is interested in pushing and stretching themselves."

"The colleges look for a well-rounded kid. And the reality is there are a lot of kids applying to college," Longacre said. She said IB can give students an edge. "It's something that makes them unique."

Although academically rigorous, IB differs from Advanced Placement courses, which the Academy also offers, because it places more emphasis on the process of learning, while AP is more focused on mastering content in a specific subject, Longacre said.

The IB program was founded by a group of international scholars in the 1960s and is based in Geneva, Switzerland.

While performance in AP courses is judged by a single exam, students in IB show what they know through a combination of tests, essays, portfolios and oral presentations. Grading is done both by Cheshire Academy teachers and outside examiners.

Nianci Li, an IB Diploma candidate, said the course of study was better suited to her learning style.

She said in her own Chinese culture, many of her peers are adept at test-taking and could excel on AP exams even without taking the courses. Li said if she tried that approach "I would not have the results that matched my expectations."

"Even though you pass the exam and you achieve the high score, it doesn't mean you actually learn something," she said. "I enjoy the process."

Cheshire Academy is the first independent boarding school in the state to be accepted into the IB program.