SCHOOL: IB a heavy loss

As a 1992 Coeur d’Alene High School graduate, I was concerned to read that the district has discontinued the International Baccalaureate (IB) program. I’m not sure what is more discouraging — the action itself, or the reasons for it.

As the Executive Director of the Washington State Board of Education, I have dedicated much of my professional life to helping schools set high expectations for all students, and offer programs with true academic rigor. The IB program is nationally recognized — even among Republican educational experts — as such a program. It contains the curriculum and standards necessary to prepare students for career and life, and has shown to improve post-secondary success by as much as 40 percent in recent studies. I am currently trying to find a local IB program, so my own daughter can attend.

Programs like IB help ensure that academic standards are not hollow or narrow, and that all students — whether future plumbers or professors — understand something about the world beyond the city limits of Coeur d’Alene. The idea that IB should be discontinued because it is “anti-American,” or requires one to pledge allegiance to the United Nations is, frankly, a little embarrassing for anyone who cares about the reputation of Coeur d’Alene schools.

If we continue to insist that global awareness and American patriotism are mutually exclusive, we will continue to put American students at a competitive disadvantage with their global competitors. That is perhaps the ultimate irony in this all.

BEN RARICK

Olympia, Wash.

Cd’A Class of 1992