haley.the.great Posted June 11, 2011 Report Share Posted June 11, 2011 People have misunderstood my original post a bit. Just because we have an exam and not everyone gets in does not mean we have to pay! Pretty much all schools in Finland are public and FREE! I think its an American thing that if a school does not let everyone in then it must be private and expensive... Thats a cultural difference, in the US if a school does not let everyone in and is higher standard then everyone assumes it must an expensive private school, while in Finland having to pay for education seems preposterous.My US public school requires an initial charge of like $800 to participate in the IB program...which includes the exam fees and (I'm guessing) teacher training. There is financial aid available for those who qualify though. That's interesting about Finnish education. Are the universities less expensive there as well? (sorry for the off-topicness) Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ferivan Posted June 11, 2011 Report Share Posted June 11, 2011 Well, I took the test to get in High School for the school I'm in (it's a public one). They only have like 500 spots (it's the only bilingual public school in my state) and like 1200 tried to get in. The top 120 students get in IB by the system in automatic, and the first week or so you can change places with people form the common courses. However, the first semester you have the same eduction as a common group, but you're already consider as an IB course. After the first semester several people drop out and their spots are taken by people of the general diploma. After that date people can get out but not get in the course, since the topics change a lot from the general to the IB. We are like 82 and I'm in 4th semester (of 6). Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
reeder45 Posted June 12, 2011 Report Share Posted June 12, 2011 Our school was actually hard to get into... well, there was just a lot of competition. It IS a public school, however you still have to go through a long application process. There are 120 spots per grade and anywhere from 500-700 people apply every year. You have to write an admissions essay, hand in a stack of about 15 registration forms, two Letters Of Recommendation from two seperate teachers, a copy of both your grade 8 first term marks and your Gr. 7 final marks, a registration fee of CDN$50.00, and a Student Resume, listing all of your awards, extracurriculars, etc. There was a lot of competition, and some VERY intelligent friends of mine got easily rejected. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Alien Posted June 12, 2011 Report Share Posted June 12, 2011 (edited) I don't know about the IB alone, but for an IB Scholarship, for which I was applying, getting in was easier that expected. All I had to do was to fill out a form, write an essay of about 300 words, take a test on English comprehension ( I'm not a native speaker, however it was RIDICULOUS, I got 98% ) including multiple choice questions, text comprehension questions and essay writing, take an Algebra test ( which - thank God - didn't count towards the Scholarship, I totally screwed up ), go through an interview and that's about it. As far as I know though, students who apply for the school have to take an Algebra test as well. The school offered 2 full tuition scholarships and 4 50% scholarships, however I was awarded with the full one. Edited June 12, 2011 by Blue Alien Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
citizenoftheuniverse Posted June 14, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 14, 2011 People have misunderstood my original post a bit. Just because we have an exam and not everyone gets in does not mean we have to pay! Pretty much all schools in Finland are public and FREE! I think its an American thing that if a school does not let everyone in then it must be private and expensive... Thats a cultural difference, in the US if a school does not let everyone in and is higher standard then everyone assumes it must an expensive private school, while in Finland having to pay for education seems preposterous.My US public school requires an initial charge of like $800 to participate in the IB program...which includes the exam fees and (I'm guessing) teacher training. There is financial aid available for those who qualify though. That's interesting about Finnish education. Are the universities less expensive there as well? (sorry for the off-topicness)Universities are a lot cheaper here than in the US, but I don´t know exact figures... Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrNinjaNate Posted August 5, 2011 Report Share Posted August 5, 2011 Well I dont know how it is for others but.... all of my county ( polk county, FL, U.S. ) (8th graders) had to have a GPA of 3.5 or higher in 7th grade, then we took a test in november, only about 90 kids made it in out of hundreds and thousands. thats numbers expected to dwindle down to 30 kids because most drop out of it...sooo....im going to stick with it! Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sammie Backman Posted August 5, 2011 Report Share Posted August 5, 2011 (edited) It was super easy, actually. We had to take some entrance tests and attend an interview. They only rejected about 10 of the stupidest applicants, and accepted approximately 45. Now, after a preparatory year there is less than 40 students left. Edited August 5, 2011 by Sammie Backman Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest IMBATMAN Posted August 5, 2011 Report Share Posted August 5, 2011 Easy, they didn't have enough kids in it so they let anybody who wanted to do it in Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Emmi Posted August 5, 2011 Report Share Posted August 5, 2011 Not hard. If you had at least a 3.0 GPA or higher all you ahd to do was fill out an application, write a little essay, and have 3 recommendation letters. And that's it. If you went to the MYP middle school like I did, you didn't even have to apply if you had a 3.0 GPA, you just had to sign a form that said you were going to continue with IB. I don't remember how many people applied, but there's about 120 spots. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lilianna009 Posted August 5, 2011 Report Share Posted August 5, 2011 I took really easy English test and damn difficult Maths test (first, when i saw it i thought I wouldn't do anything, and maybe i'm not a genius, but i've never had difficulty with maths at school). I had an interview with a Polish teacher, checking my knowledge and an interview with the IB Coordinator. Then I had to give them my school report for this year. Oh, and we had to fill in a form, questions like 'interests', 'achievements', 'why IB' etc. C'est tout. I heard there were sth about 60 ppl and 39 including me got in . This is a public (not brit meaning ) school. We only have to buy books and pay fees for exams. Well, only. It's still not that little. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mija Posted August 6, 2011 Report Share Posted August 6, 2011 For normal student it wouldn't be difficult but I had to go through a scholarship competition to get into the class. It wasn't easy but not undoable. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChikkyD Posted August 6, 2011 Report Share Posted August 6, 2011 Our IB school (public) has 3 grade, 10, 11 and 12 (in which year 10 is pre-IB, and year 11&12 are IB1 and IB2), and there are 150 MAX spots in each grade. Students must take 3 entrance exams; English, Maths, Abstract Thinking. The exams themselves aren't TOO difficult, but we haven't had a grade fill to capacity yet. We also have a LOT of drop outs, who can't handle the rigor of IB and go back to a mainstream school. My grade started off with 108, and we now have 78. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bookaholic Posted November 15, 2011 Report Share Posted November 15, 2011 We took the test for free and had to send in an application.The test was really easy, but ALOT of people tried out. I think less than a fifth actually got in.I'm in preIB right now, but the drop out rate is 50% Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
giantsushi Posted July 5, 2012 Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 I went to two IB schools. The first one had an entrance exam which was basically an IQ test (no exaggeration there) and an interview with a teacher (about your favourite subject). The second one was more challenging, similar to an SAT test, but English was slightly easier and Maths was so much harder. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darta Jenn Bush Posted July 5, 2012 Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 About 300 people applied and only 34 got in. We had to pass math exam to even get in the school and then English exam for IB. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Positron Posted July 5, 2012 Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 I don't remember the exact figures, but I think there were about 100-150 applicants and 20 were accepted. The "application" consisted of two parts: GPA and entrance exams. Both were worth up to ten points, so the maximum points were 20. In the entrance examinations we had a maths test and based on the maths test we were cut down to about 50 applicants. Then we wrote an essay and finally we had two interviews. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aura Posted July 27, 2012 Report Share Posted July 27, 2012 It was as easy as saying that I wanted to do the IB. Actually, I got into my school 2 months before the end of pre-IB, and they still accepted me.But then again, my IB cohort consists of 2 dudes and me. Everyone else dropped out in pre-IB. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AkHyldmo Posted July 29, 2012 Report Share Posted July 29, 2012 Well, I went to some kind of a music school... About after one month in second year I decided that this was not the thing that I wanted to do, so I called the IB coordinator at the high school in town and said that I wanted to join. They accepted me without almost any questions except what subjects I wanted to take. The next day I started my first day in IB1! Easy as that! I tend to laugh when I think back at all the things that my IB classmates said when I started the IB... "You have ruined your life! What the heck have you done?!" And when I started there they were like 20 people so the IB isn't that popular here yet, probably because it started like 2 years ago in my town Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
caroline.st18 Posted August 13, 2012 Report Share Posted August 13, 2012 I have never thought that I will be attending IB course. My friend convienced me to take the exams (just to check out my knowledge), which were required by admission. I had to pass 4 exams: Polish, English, Maths and additional subject - I chose Biology. I maintained that the tests were really hard (especially Polish and Maths).To my astonishment I get into the interview. On the interview I was asked to talk about myself and to answer to one of two topics (drew lots). Interview went well, but I still supposed that I won't get into the course.I was really surprised when I found out that I'm in. I had to think twice, before I made a decision that I'm leaving my last school. It was tough choise. I hope that I won't regret it. Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeriPeri Posted August 20, 2012 Report Share Posted August 20, 2012 Not hard at all. At my school anyone can join IB, free of cost. It's nice! Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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