Switching from IB school to American school - will they mind lack of curriculum experience?

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Coimbra
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Joined: Wed Feb 09, 2022 3:15 am

Switching from IB school to American school - will they mind lack of curriculum experience?

Post by Coimbra »

Asking for a friend of mine.

Are international American schools typically hesitant to hire someone who has only taught IB and not AP?

This concerns a top American School, so the kind that will have a lot of applicants and can therefore be picky.
Everything else on CV is top notch so only lack of AP experience might be something that they will mind.

Thanks!
sciteach
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Re: Switching from IB school to American school - will they mind lack of curriculum experience?

Post by sciteach »

It really depends on what you teach, location and year level.

If it's Yr 11/12 - then having experience is important as you would have already taught the curriculum a couple of times. You would also have data to show your students results from previous years.

This does not mean that you are not employable - just that a top tier candidate WITH experience would probably be placed above a top tier candidate WITHOUT experience.
sid
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Re: Switching from IB school to American school - will they mind lack of curriculum experience?

Post by sid »

Some will care, some won't. There are too many factors for a straightforward answer.
Best advice is to apply and see.
PsyGuy
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Post by PsyGuy »

If its SLL and its for an AP appointment, and the IS has a healthy applicant pool and can be selective, than a lack of AP experience is going to matter. That doesnt mean a candidate cant bring something else to table or have other factors that make them an attractive higher, but in the theoretical bubble of all other factors being equal lack of experience in the teaching assignment is going to matter.

SLL experience across curriculum (DIP, AP, A/A*) are all highly congruent. Exam performance in one curriculum has utility in predicting success in another curriculum.
Coimbra
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Re: Switching from IB school to American school - will they mind lack of curriculum experience?

Post by Coimbra »

Thanks for the feedback!
Pretty much what I expected then.
I am a recruiter myself but have only worked at IB schools, and to be honest I also prefer candidates with at least 3-4 years of IB experience.
I have hired teachers with only AP experience for DP positions and usually it does take them a while to fully adapt. But AP teachers that switched to IB tend to say that AP is less challenging than IB. So I thought maybe American schools that offer only AP might not value curriculum experience as much, as switching from IB to AP is easier than the other way around from what I've been told.
He has experience teaching both CS and HL Mathematics and the rest of his CV is pretty stellar so I can still see him reach the interview stage. We shall see.
PsyGuy
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Post by PsyGuy »

@Coimbra

::looking around for @Sid:: How long is a piece of string, and to that end how long is a while? Days, weeks, months, terms? Many ITs adopt in about a month.

AP is less challenging compared to DIP but its also half the time (1 year for AP vs. 2 years for DIP).

Adopting the curriculum and the content between AP and DIP is about the same expenditure in time and resources regardless of which curriculum your coming from and going to. The ethos, terminology, pedagogy and to varying extents the methodology is what takes the most adjustment resources going from AP to DIP. In terms of curriculum content, methodology is often the deciding factor in the adjustment period, it depends how ingrained IBness is in the IS? There are AP ITs/DTs that implement a very inquiry based approach just as there are DIP programs that dont look very IB.
Coimbra
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Re: Reply

Post by Coimbra »

Longer than a month in my experience, from AP to DP but can only speak for what I have seen.
Though heard DP to AP takes about a month for most teachers as it is more straight-forward.
Anyway all teachers eventually get there in the end.
PsyGuy
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Post by PsyGuy »

@Coimbra

How much longer than a month?

I dont buy it though. The curriculum content between AP and DIP is highly congruent. The difference that makes DIP longer is the IBness, the IB Learner Profile and all the rest of the culty ethos and terminology. That takes more time for DIP because AP doesnt bother with it and its not critical to the content material.
Heliotrope
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Re: Switching from IB school to American school - will they mind lack of curriculum experience?

Post by Heliotrope »

@Coimbra
I know a good number of IB teachers that got a job at great American schools teaching AP, and teachers who have switched from American to great IB schools. I've also heard switching from AP to IB takes longer, but we're only talking weeks or a low single digit number of months.
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