Teaching Your Children Well

Consider also:

Using 2002 data (the latest available at this writing), 24,578 Minnesota students took Advanced Placement Program exams, and 63.9 percent scored 3 or better on a range of 1 to 5. Our students beat the national average of 63.1 percent.

Minnesota ranks twelfth in the nation in number of International Baccalaureate Programmes that prepare and test students aiming for college. Well-established programs at Central High School in St. Paul and Southwest High in Minneapolis rank among the top 100 IB schools in the world in terms of students taking the greatest number of IB exams.

More than 90 percent of U.S. colleges and universities have policies granting incoming students academic credit for qualifying AP and IB grades; many of those students could enter college at the sophomore level. That bodes well for Minnesota public school students—and their bill-paying parents—because of Minnesota’s high AP and IB participation.

But statistics tell only part of the story. Most important is what parents really want from their children’s school experience. A shot at a highly selective college. The opportunity to be a productive member of the community. A chance for a full life, regardless of a child’s native abilities or disabilities. By all of those standards, Minnesota’s public schools deliver handsomely, equal to or better than any private or parochial institution, and generally at a lower cost to the family.

The College Track
On the subject of academic success, let’s first look at the International Baccalaureate Programme, a rigorous, comprehensive curriculum geared to the entrance requirements of the world’s most selective colleges and universities. Families in Minnesota can take advantage of this unique program only in a public school.

That’s right. The toughest academic curriculum in the world is available to any family who seeks it out—in the school districts of Minneapolis, St. Paul, South St. Paul, St. Louis Park, Robbinsdale, Minnetonka, Fairmont, and Grand Rapids. The success of this program in serving academically motivated students has been so dramatic that it is expanding into middle and elementary schools as well.

The IB curriculum was developed at the urging of diplomats who wanted their children to be on a uniform track to attend high-quality universities anywhere in the world. IB schools go through an elaborate certification process, which includes training teachers, establishing “areas of inquiry,” developing a curriculum, and administering a testing regimen that is the eighth wonder of the academic world. Tests are taken during a three-week period, then sent to and graded at international sites, ensuring fairness across the board and comparability of grades across all schools everywhere, from London to St. Louis Park.   

But IB stands for much more than intensive training, certifying, and testing. The program’s exceptionally motivated teachers and students speak with energy and excitement about learning, discovery, and intellectual adventure. IB programs are designed to draw out what’s best in both teachers and students. The result is a student who knows how to write and think at the highest level. The testing “simply” measures the results of an intense, personal, and rewarding educational experience.

You don’t have to take our word for it.

Nathan Wersal, from Golden Valley, is a 2004 recipient of an IB diploma through Robbinsdale Cooper High School. This fall he began his sophomore year at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. After taking what was then called the “pre-IB” curriculum during his first two years, Nathan embarked on the entire intensive IB diploma sequence, including the required Theory of Knowledge course. “I wanted to challenge myself,” he says of his choice of IB, “and [the program] was portrayed as the most thorough and challenging curriculum the Robbinsdale district offered.”