Warrior Word

by Sanvisree Vishnum

I was at the CTE Annual Re-Cap Dinner a few weeks ago. After the initial presentation, our district CTE director ,Mark Madison, asked every group to review our progress for this year through questions pertaining to the goals set at the previous dinner. I was attending as a part of the student advisory committee, a group of high school upperclassmen from different high schools in the district. We were reviewing our personalized questions, and it was going well until one question asked if most students and families are aware of the opportunities our CTE program has to offer. All of the student representatives said students at their schools are aware of these opportunities, except for 3 students who kept quiet. The school all 3 of these students came from? Edmonds-Woodway.

I considered not opposing the rest of the group, but I looked over at our other Edmonds-Woodway representatives, and felt the need to interject, in order to tell the group what I noticed about my school.

I am a junior in the full International Baccalaureate diploma program. We often have meetings with our IB coordinators during advisories talking about the Extended Essay (EE), Creativity-Activity-Service hours (CAS), and other aspects of the IB program. For example, we have had multiple meetings learning how to craft our question, find the right supervisor, and research for our EE. On top of IB-related meetings, we’ve also been asked to attend sessions with presentations from the IB coordinators, Ms. Deschler and Mr. Wellington, and the college and career counselor, Ms. Christensen, teaching how to search for colleges as a soon-to-be senior. At the first meeting, I looked around to see who else was in the library, wondering how the whole junior class would fit into just one section of the library. But behold, it was just IB juniors in the room. I pointed it out to my friends. “Is this just an IB thing? I thought this was about college searches in general…” Assuming many juniors at our school were planning on applying to 4-year institutions after high school, I was confused. It didn’t make sense; shouldn’t all junior students be getting the same information? Every other meeting about college searches and financial aid after that, it was the same story. I never once heard about any similar meetings being conducted for all other non full-IB students.

Through ManageBac, the application used for communication and organization by IB students and coordinators, we receive updates about new volunteering opportunities and other programs. This is within reason, because IB students need to complete 50 hours each of creativity, activity, and service in the two year program, so these updates help many IB students fulfill these requirements. But, I don’t find any issue in these same opportunities being sent out to the rest of the school.

It isn’t accessible to be an IB student for everyone. Being a full-IB diploma student requires hours of dedication to studying for the classes, for the Internal Assessments (IA), the in-class tests, the actual IB exams, CAS hours and the CAS project, the 4,000-word independent research paper for the EE, spending extra hours at school each week for the 7th class, Theory of Knowledge, and the paper you must write for that. When colleges review your application, they only see whether you are on track to be awarded the diploma, and your GPA after taking these challenging courses. Colleges learn if the actual diploma is awarded the July after you graduate, along with your exam and paper scores. So, extracurriculars and what you do outside of school matters on your college applications, but the IB takes away from that time students have to do that.

On the other hand, students can actually count sport practices for CAS activity hours or music lessons for creativity, and students can choose a topic they are passionate about for their EE. In this way, IB does allow flexibility to enjoy hobbies while still counting them for credit in the program.

The problem arises when we realize that students who need to work, care for siblings and family, and have other outside factors affecting their life, will struggle to do well in the IB program. Even if they are willing to put in the effort to succeed in the program, they may be unable to simply stop working, as the money they make may support their family.

In general, if a student decided to simply take all IB classes but not earn the full diploma, they would have far more time outside of school compared to full-IB kids. They wouldn’t need to stay for an extra period for TOK, be stressed over IB exams, search for an EE supervisor, and panic over what the IB graders would think of their IAs. They would study for their classes, which are challenging and provide a generous learning experience, and continue to dedicate the rest of their time to their interests. They wouldn’t need to compromise their hobbies nor a challenging academic curriculum.
The privilege of time plays a role in who is able to start and complete the IB diploma program successfully and who isn’t. Nevertheless, it should not restrict who gets information about various opportunities in our community. The Edmonds-Woodway staff, specifically the career and counseling department, should try to ensure that all students are given equal opportunity to further their academic careers. I feel that this is definitely achievable in the next school year, and the CTE Student Advisory Committee wrote this goal down specifically for Edmonds-Woodway High. If other schools are able to share opportunities with every student, why can’t we?