Wake County Schools Earn International Baccalaureate Authorization

February 24, 2003 - The International Baccalaureate Organization has authorized three Wake County Public School System schools to officially provide the organization's Middle Years Programme.

Students displayed flags of the world as students, educators, and community leaders gathered to celebrate IB authorization for the three schools.

Superintendent Bill McNeal, community leaders, educators and students joined at East Millbrook Middle School today to celebrate the milestone with music, singing and speeches.

"With this authorization, Wake County becomes one of the nation's leaders in the International Baccalaureate program, offering its academic challenges to students from their first to their last year of school," McNeal said. "The International Baccalaureate approach to middle school instruction is one we offer to all students at our IB middle schools and not a select few."

Broughton High School, Daniels Middle School and East Millbrook Middle have successfully achieved full authorization as International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme schools.

The IBO has grown from a handful of international schools in the mid-1960s to more than 1,395 schools around the world today. The organization grew out of international schools efforts to establish a common curriculum and university entry credential. The IBO aims to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect.

The International Baccalaureate Organization offers three programmes: Primary Years, Middle Years, and Diploma.

"Becoming authorized puts us in a class that is rarefied," said Dr. Flo Durway who directs Wake County's IB program. "We are the first North Carolina school system and one of the few in the nation to have all three programs authorized."

"We are making IB available to all students, and it benefits all of our students," Durway said. "We are not handpicking students to participate in the program. This approach makes us different from most programs."

Earlier this month, Farmington Woods Elementary was authorized to offer the IB Primary Years Programme. It became the first IB Primary Years school in North Carolina and the 17th in the United States.

Superintendent Bill McNeal congratulated principals Diane Payne of Broughton High, Dana King of East Millbrook Middle, and Dr. David Dennis of Daniels Middle at a reception.

Dear Ms. Payne, Ms. King, and Dr. Dennis,

I am pleased to inform you that your school's application to participate in the International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme in partnership has been accepted with immediate effect. From our headquarters in Geneva I extend a sincere welcome to you, your colleagues and your students. I hope that you will find the new experience with the IBO to be as rewarding as others have discovered in the past.

George Walker,
IBO Director General
Feb. 19, 2003

The three Wake schools authorized to offer the Middle Years Programme are the first in Wake County, the third in the state and the 34th in the United States to offer this program. The three schools are the second partnership in the United States to achieve IB authorization.

The IB Diploma Programme is offered at Broughton High School and Enloe High School. There are 20 schools offering the Diploma Programme in North Carolina and 496 in the United States.

The IB authorization is the culmination of five years of professional development, program enhancements, and tireless work by the three schools.

"Staff members have attended various weekend workshops and conferences for several years," said David Ansbacher, East Millbrook assistant principal. "We have realized the strength of cooperative planning in both department, team and full-faculty approaches. Through all of these endless hours of preparation, our faculty is becoming more and more comfortable with the IB areas of interaction, through which IB is presented in class."

The middle years Program offers an educational approach that is based upon the concepts of global education, communication, and intercultural awareness. As global education is developed, students are aided in growth towards self-reliance and responsible participation in society. In stressing communication, IB schools place fundamental importance on achieving full command of one's own language and on the acquisition of a foreign language. Students are encouraged to develop intercultural awareness along with a genuine understanding of their own history and traditions.

"Our students are being prepared to meet the challenges of the world," Ansbacher said. "Our economy is global as is our population. In order to adequately prepare our children for what lies ahead, they need to be educated in a global context."

As the schools have prepared for authorization, students at the three schools have shown impressive growth on the state's End-of-Grade testing. IB schools adhere to the North Carolina Standard Course of Study while also learning through IB's five areas of interaction: Approaches to Learning, Community, Health and Social Education, Environment, and Homo Faber, or man the creator. The combination provides students with a rich, international education that prepares them to think critically and see connections between their work in class and the world around them.

"Approaches to learning helps students be more successful in the classroom by helping them stay better organized, learn to research, and realize the relevance of what they are learning," said Wynn Cherry of Broughton High School. "Community service encourages students to see how involvement in the community benefits them as well as others. With Homo faber, students are asked to note how man's creativity has moved civilization forward. Environment and Health and Social Education work in similar ways to synthesize information and connect what is going on in the classroom to other areas."

Last week, the Wake County Board of Education agreed to seek authorization for an IB Middle Years Programme partnership at Garner Senior High School, North Garner Middle School and East Garner Middle School.

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