Diploma Results 2008

We are happy and excited about the very impressive results from our first IB Diploma class. Our IB Exam results have shown TIS to be well above the IB World average in all aspects of the Diploma Programme. A huge round of congratulations is in order to all from the hard work of the students and teachers to the support from the parents and school administration.

All of the IB World statistics have not yet been published, but they tend to vary little from year to year and where indicated below, the comparison is to May 2007. Some of the highlights are as follows:

• TIS students have earned on average grades 10% above this year’s averages for the IB world in their subjects.
• We had 16 Diploma Candidates sit for exams out of about 40,000 candidates worldwide with an overall pass rate of 88%. This is almost 10% above the IB World pass rate for 2007 which was 78.8 %.
• TIS student scores ranged from 23-39 points with a mean score of 32.2 points. The IB World mean for 2007 was 29.6 points.
• 7 of our students earned the valuable IB Bilingual Diploma by successfully completing literature courses in English as well as Russian, Korean or German. The world average for Bilingual Diplomas is about 30% compared to our 50%.
• Special recognition goes to Mrs. Lee and her four Korean students ALL of whom earned an amazing grade of 7 on the 1 to 7 scale.
• Earning an “A” on an Extended Essay is not easy and in total there were 5 students who earned an “A” (3 in Korean, one in Biology and one in Economics) and two students who earned a “B” (one in Chemistry and one in History).
• In Theory of Knowledge (TOK) which culminates in an intellectually demanding essay, worldwide in 2007 only 5% of the students earned an “A”. At TIS two of our students earned an “A” and 11 or 69% of them earned a “B” or higher compared to the IB World percentage of only 36%.
• TIS students also showed themselves to be particularly strong in the sciences with students scoring almost one full grade or 13% above the world averages for 2008.
• Creativity, Action and Service (CAS) requires students to engage in reflective experiential learning in supervised and evaluated activities outside of the school day for 3-4 hours per week. CAS is particularly important not only for student development in areas of leadership and personal responsibility but also heavily influences university admissions and scholarship decisions. Students in the class of 2008 demonstrated excellent levels of learning in CAS. They averaged 6.6 hours a week in approved, evaluated and balanced CAS activities. TIS students more than doubled the IB requirement for the Diploma and this sends out a strong positive message to university admissions committees.

The class of 2008 has set high standards for TIS. To the class of 2009, we wish strong study habits, perseverance, critical thinking skills, the initiative for hard work and lots of parental support to succeed as we they enter into their last year of high school and the IB Diploma Programme.

Tim Getter
IB Diploma Programme Coordinator
Tashkent International School