Despite IB Growth, College Credit Is Elusive

"St. Mary's is in the early stages of our review," said Wesley P. Jordan, dean of admissions and financial aid at St. Mary's College of Maryland. "I have not yet done a thorough review of the assessment literature, so I don't know what exists" for one-year IB courses.

Some also suggested that the College Board lobbies for its courses more energetically than the IB organization, whose North American office is in New York, does for its programs.

The debate over AP and IB is flaring in western Fairfax County as some parents fight a redistricting plan by the school system that would increase the students at South Lakes High School in Reston. Because South Lakes is an IB school, some parents who oppose new school boundaries are complaining about college policies against giving one-year IB credit. IB educators say their students are often allowed, even without college credit, to take higher-level courses in college once they pass a placement test. Some parents remain skeptical.

"Occasionally, we lose students because parents fear IB is somehow a lesser education, largely because they perceive that universities do not give it the same credence," Lisa B. Green and Wendy Vu, IB coordinators at Robinson Secondary School in Fairfax, wrote in an e-mail. "We think the discrimination is largely due to ignorance. College and university people have not taken the time to explore the curriculum in more detail."

Leeb said some of her students have begun IB information campaigns in college, taking the IB syllabus and samples of the five-hour final exams to department offices and winning concessions. "But not every college freshman has the time or energy to navigate through the NASCAR-style system at some college to get to department chairs and argue the case," Leeb said.

Some students have taken drastic measures. Beth Groeneman, IB coordinator at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School in Montgomery County, said one of her students enrolled in 2006 at a small Midwestern university that had heavily recruited her. But the university refused to give credit for her IB courses. The student grew so frustrated that she transferred to a more prestigious Southern university that granted all of her credits.

In several local schools, particularly in Montgomery, IB students often take the AP test in the same subject to be assured of college credit. To some educators, that seems a waste of time. "Our emphasis is not on gaining college credit," said Greg Croghan, principal of Fairfax's Edison High School, which has IB. "It is on encouraging students to extend themselves intellectually and on preparing for college."

Many colleges will give credit for one-year IB courses if they are among the six required for a full IB diploma. But those rules don't apply to AP, in which a course can receive credit even if it is the only AP class a student takes.

Anthony Cruz-Martinez, a graduate of Mount Vernon High, is one of the few local IB students who has won credit for his one-year IB courses. He said the registrar at St. Martin's University in Lacey, Wash., looked confused at first when he sought credit for the courses. Cruz-Martinez is not certain how it happened, but the credit came through.

At St. Martin's, Cruz-Martinez said, "I was able to get into third-year classes in history and English with no issue whatsoever, and I have found that it is nowhere near as difficult as any of my IB classes or exams."