CBSE Vs IB

Okay. This may seem very academic for my first entry. But these two education boards, namely CBSE and IB have played a role in shaping 'My Journey". What you read in textbooks not only helps you score in exams but also shapes the way you think, at least for me. 

This link is a good comparison of various education boards in the Indian Subcontinent.

http://www.slideshare.net/skoolz/ibvscbsevsicse-6709046

My opinion is very subjective. You need to keep in mind that I not only changed my education board but also my school and my country. I originally come from a small town in northen Maharashtra. I studied in a conservative catholic school. Then, I get this scholarship and I am off to HK. 

Actually I applied to United World Colleges ( http://uwc.org/ ) and I got a scholarship from the one in Hong Kong (its known as Li Po Chun United World College.) All the UWCs except the one in Venezuela follow the IB.

The International Baccalaureate (or the IB) is a Diploma Program started sometime in the 1960's. According to a few reliable sources (my teachers and ex-students, to be precise), its gaining tremendous popularity and is on the verge of becoming the most successful education program in the whole wide world (that's what I believe). CBSE, on the other hand, is an education program confined only to India (I could be wrong) and is run by the Central Govt. As a student of both the two 'diverse' education systems, I'll be evaluating their strengths and weaknesses. Why diverse? Continue reading and you'll see.

I followed CBSE in my previous school . After getting a 10/10 GPA on all my subjects in my boards, I wanted to take all the challenging subjects at LPC. But, I was putting a lot of pressure on myself (then I changed my subjects) Actually I was in Kota for three months at Bansal classes last year (P3 batch), but when I got this offer, I really wanted to come to Hong Kong. 

Weird, huh? :P

Was it a good move?(I mean, doing the IB) Yes... and No. I had no other choice other than doing the IB since everyone else was doing it (!!)So... with a zest of passion and enthusiasm, I undertook the IB Diploma Program to finish my schooling career with. But boy, was I in for a surprise! First came the concept of Higher Level and Standard Level subjects. Out of 6 different subjects, a student has to choose 3 HL's and 3 SL's. Maths, at least one science subject, one humanity and two languages are compulsory. The 6th subject can be of your own choice. Since I am going to do something in medicine (hopefully), I chose another Science subject. In the CBSE, your whole future life (more or less) is decided as soon as you finish 10th grade. How? Because we get to choose 'streams' instead of subjects. And each stream is specifically concentrated on only one type of study - Science, Commerce or Humanities. So a person doing the Science stream has an even narrower and more concentrated approach towards Engineering or Medical. So, what good was Business management for me? Well.. I don't know. What I do know is that I enjoyed doing it.. more than Spanish (which was also a new subject for me).

Let me try to clear one concept from the Indian minds. We have this superiority complex that our Indian education system is the best and we have the smartest minds. I agree with the later (with all my desi pride, but not the former). I feel, CBSE promotes rote learning. I know, it’s intense but we have no scope to think out of the box. Whereas, for IB you have to get your minds thinking hard. It focuses a lot more on critical thinking. You have a lot of practical work to do. You have to write essays in math. Design your own labs. Analyze literature all at the same time.

Let me take Math Higher for example. I did pretty well in math till 10^th grade. Even in Kota it was among my strong subjects. Till this part of my life I felt only practice is the key to getting good grades in math. But when I started studying IB, complex mathematical concepts came in. Getting the right answers was not the top priority but the how? and the why? Behind the answer was more important. Knowing all the formulas by heard did not do any good. Even the essays, required a lot of thinking and time. When I came back in summer and showed my IB math textbook to my previous math teacher he said, “Yeh toh BE walla math hai.”

Biology and Chemistry were not a cakewalk as well (Yes, I dropped Physics and took up Biology). Designing your own experiments. And then analyzing them was quite difficult in the beginning. Even the syllabus was quite vast. But learning was fun!

There's this Internal Assessment that makes up to 25% of the final IB grade. What is Internal Assessment?... in one word - nightmare! Now, I won't just stop there when you have already managed to read so far. Anyway, back to the IA topic. It is same for all the Sciences. All you have to do is to stack up all (or as many as you can find) the labs, experiments, activites etc. done during the entire two years - 12 and 13 in one big folder. (Oh, this is another difference, the IB goes up to 13th grade whereas with the CBSE, you finish in 12th itself!). The IBO then randomly choses that big folder (also called the 'Portfolio') of someone from your class, to be graded by the IB examiners.

After taking English A1 standard, I read all the books I might have never read in my entire life. The books had interesting themes and characters. These books made my way of thinking more matured. Even analyzing these books made me think in a different way. (Yes! I am very grateful to this education system  for making me a ‘grown up’ )

Spanish ab initio, another awesome subject.  It is for people who have no idea about the subject. Spanish ab initio has been amazing so far. Not only did we learn the language but we learnt a lot about the Spanish and Latin American culture. We saw Spanish movies. Now, I can even sing a few songs in Spanish :) . 

In CBSE (till 10^th atleast) You study for the ultimate board exams. There is no room for growing up. But some subjects like democratic politics (which I don’t expect to study in China ;) were really enriching. CBSE taught me hard work and IB taught me thinking. A combination of the two will be awesome!

P.S.- I forgot to mention EE, TOK, World Lit and Group 4 project. I will do that in my next entry. Till then adios!