Why are Internal Assessments so important for those who want to score well in their IB subjects? The information shared in this article mostly applies to seniors who are taking IB Diploma or IB Certificate. According to IBO (the official IB website), IB grades are calculated on a scale of one to seven in each subject. In addition, it is assessed based on how the applicant scores on paper one, paper two, paper three, and Internal Assessment. In other words, the applicant will be assessed based on his performance in their world exam (paper 1, paper 2, and paper 3) and the performance from his high school (IA). The world exam solely depends on the applicant’s preparation and circumstances on the day of the exam, however, the applicant has control over IA’s. IA takes 20 percent of the final grade, meaning it takes a significant part in the IB grading system. For these reasons, IA’s are really important for those applicants who want to achieve good grades in IB. On top of that, it is also crucial for those who want to bump up their IB predicted grades. GAA releases the second predicted score in January. The teachers mainly focus on students’ IA’s to give them second predicted scores since there aren’t any big exams coming up before the Mock Exam, which will take place in February. One of our GAA IB Diploma students said that it is extremely stressful to complete IA’s as many universities’ deadlines overlap with IA’s internal deadlines.    

Each different IB subject requires a different format of IA’s. World Language and English require students to do oral presentations for their IA’s and Science/Math/Social Studies ask students to write a research paper based on their chosen research questions. GAA has an internal deadline for IA’s by the beginning of January, but, lots of teachers set a preferred deadline before the winter break so that they can give feedback to students and give them time to fix their IA’s during the break. Therefore, as an IB student and as a writer of this article, it is highly recommended to put their efforts into IA’s and finish them before the winter break.