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We begin a series of post from our alumni Jaxon Tay!
Jaxon Tay (HCIS class of 2023), graduated with a score of 44 and yes (he got A for Math EE)!
His first post below details his thoughts and advice for juniors in the IB subject selection!
As a Secondary 4 student looking to start their IB Journey soon, a pivotal fork in the road you will encounter is your IB subject selection. This likely isn't your first time making such a decision (as you already made a similar decision in Secondary 3). However, this choice bears much greater weight. So how do you tick all the right boxes and set yourself up for success before embarking on your 2 year long journey?
It's generally a good idea to play to your strengths, in like, anything, so do the same here. Look back at your grades throughout secondary school. What did you score well on? Choose those as your HL subjects. Did you excel more on STEM subjects or the humanities? If you've scored well on, say, biology this whole time and think you've got the aptitude to maintain that performance into the IBDP then go for HL biology. As for your SLs, it's perfectly fine to opt for subjects you don't feel as proficient in (Take me for example- I'm really not much of a humanities wizz) so I chose to do business management as a SL subject. Look, it's impossible to be good at everything (unless you are- then, well, kudos to you bro) and we all have subjects we don't like. But that's something you at least have agency over as you venture into the IBDP. Choose to take your least favorites at SL (but don't ignore them) and dedicate most of your energy to your HLs (things you hopefully actually enjoy).
The topic of your HLs segways quite nicely into my next point- think about what you want to do at university. Or even in your future career. At this stage it's wise to do at least some research on the university courses you may be interested in. If, say, you're aiming to study economics in university then taking Maths and Economics HL would be two no-brainer decisions. Or if you’re an aspiring doctor then Chemistry HL would be what you're after. In specialized courses at higher education institutions your HL scores are what matters most to most universities out there. They are proof that you have the aptitude and baseline knowledge required to take on that specific course at university. Also, don't fret if, say, you want to study psychology at university but your school dosen't offer psychology HL, or if you want to study compsci and you didn't take compsci HL. Again, check your desired course’s requirements. Before I close this segment off I'd like to take a moment to empathize a bit about university course choices. I think that asking young and impressionable 16-18 year olds to choose what they want to do for the rest of their lives is vastly unjust. So in the event that you don't know what you want to pursue at university at this point, that's okay, I'd say go back to point one and choose what you're currently good at.
This last pointer refers to something you should look back and think about when you're done, but is also good to consider throughout your decision making process. An important question to ask yourself is: with ABCXYZ subjects on my plate, am I able to cope with the workload? Now I get that the ability to handle workloads differs from person to person but some subjects in the IB are very content heavy. If a person took Geography Biology and History all at a higher level, that is pretty much a Mount Everests’ volume of information they will have to commit to memory for exams. Couple that with all the coursework and other rigors of the IBDP (remember! You still have CAS/EE/TOK/3 other SL Subjects), will that person still be able to handle all that work? Well, in the most exceptional cases, yes? Maybe? But that subject combination genuinely scares me because at that point you’d be married to your desk at all times. My advice would be to strike a balance between content heavy subjects like the three aforementioned ones with other less content heavy choices. Don't take on more than you can handle!
Alright that's all I've got to say for now good luck out there you soon-to-be IB combatants.
Oh yeah one more thing, this sounds cliché as hell but don't let all those horror stories of people losing sleep or dropping out because of deadlines scare you. The IBDP is a very rewarding program, given that you actually do stuff consistently. So long as your school is run by actual sympathetic human beings and not ChatGPT your deadlines should all be pretty reasonable (it gets tough sometimes- I know but that's part of the challenge and who dosen't love a good challenge amirite?
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