By Chloe Hsieh

One of GHC’s lauded programs, the IB program is well known to be one of the most challenging pathways available for Granada Hills Charter (GHC) students. Despite the rigor, the new IB junior cohort is bigger than ever, boasting over 100 students. What makes it worth it despite the tough exams and truckloads of homework. After all, wouldn’t Advanced Placement (AP) classes serve the same purpose of rigor and extra college credits?

Advanced Placement (AP) classes are college-level courses high school students can take to earn college credits early. The most notable factor of these courses is that one needs to get a passing score of three or higher on the culminating AP exam in the spring to claim these credits. 

Junior and senior IB courses, however, differ in a few key ways. The most obvious difference is that IB courses span the course of two school years, in comparison to AP classes’ one year– sometimes one semester– course lengths. Topics are therefore covered more in-depth over a longer period of time to achieve a deeper, more thorough understanding. This makes IB’s “AP exam” equivalent at the end of senior year much more formidable, since it covers all knowledge accumulated over both IB students’ junior and senior years. 

However, it’s considered “worth it” because just like AP courses, they are recognized by many universities to count towards your college credit. There’s also the reason why the program is called the International Baccalaureate. These IB class credits are recognized in other countries too, for those looking to study abroad.

Additionally, to earn the IB diploma, each student is required to carry out a Community, Activity, and Service (CAS) project in the background of their coursework. This community service project could be on anything the student is passionate about, as long as they have a way to document their efforts and measure their impact on others.

Despite all of these key differences, there’s one aspect of the program that many IB students consider even more important  as well as the main driver for why they remain in the program, no matter the rigor.

“I think a lot of it has to do with the community,” IB junior Joydex Soldevilla said. “You’re always around the same people in your IB classes, and I think that helps you build a bigger sense of shared community, especially in a school that’s as big as Granada Hills Charter. It really helps you build better connections, relations, and a better support system for yourself.”

In the IB program, course schedules are relatively inflexible, due to program requirements. Every IB student must take IB-specific courses. While this can be viewed as a hindrance to those who plan to take as many difficult, AP-level courses as possible, it also serves to build friendships within IB cohorts.

“In IB you can relate and form connections with others easily because you all share classes and teachers,” IB junior Aabha Upadhyaya said. “You’re all in the same boat.”

That’s not to mention the bonds built with people besides your peers.

“Teachers are also part of that community,” Upadhyaya said. “They really know you at the end of the day.”

When you’re in the same teachers’ classes for two years, students agree that a closer bond with your teachers is merely a byproduct.

Soldevilla feels that  IB students get more guidance as well. Not just because you’re closer to your instructors, but also in the monthly full-day workshops for their community service projects.

“Other kids at Granada Hills Charter don’t get the same time to really think about what they want to do or how they want to impact their community,” Soldevilla said. “We also get taken out for support with our college applications and resumes, which you don’t really get in school outside of IB.”

AP courses, since they aren’t program specific, don’t have the same sense of community. However, since there also aren’t requirements to take certain courses like IB’s mandatory Theory of Knowledge class, a Granada Guaranteed Curriculum (GGC) student taking AP classes would have more flexibility to pick and choose their schedules.

Junior Penelope Huh was in the pre-IB program in 9th and 10th grade, but ultimately chose not to continue into the 11th and 12th Diploma program. Instead, she’s part of the GGC student population who’s shooting for an AP Capstone diploma, rather than an IB one.

“I just felt like the pre-IB program was full of extra work,” Huh said. “Extra work and extra stress.”

Huh is taking four AP classes this year, in part for her AP Capstone requirements, and she still feels as if this isn’t a big step up in difficulty from her pre-IB classes in 10th grade.

But no matter whether these students stay within the program or eventually make the decision to leave, all can agree: IB is not for the weak.