A Look into the IB Diploma

The International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma is an impressive award given to the best and brightest students. It gives students a better chance at getting into prestigious colleges and looks glamorous on resumes. Or does it? This greatly sought after title may not be as beneficial as students think, especially considering the immense stress and workload that IB students are put under. Senior Justine Gacho (12) said she chose to pursue the IB diploma because of the curriculum it offered. “The IB diploma is actually kind of the reason I went to Lindbergh. I liked the idea of having a curriculum that was all encompassing and that I could be able to do liberal arts in addition to everything else. It turns out it’s basically extra work on top of the AP course load, which shouldn’t be the way it is,” said Gacho. A main principle of the International Baccalaureate is for students to receive a global education and be able to think of an international level, applying what they’ve learned to worldwide issues. Many IB students are also familiar with this global perspective due to the fact that 80% of senior IB candidates this year are immigrants or children of immigrants.

“I think being the child of an immigrant helps a lot because in a lot of the classes you have to apply global aspects to the topic in order to get good grades and being from a background where I have other cultures to use it helps me with my papers, and I can draw on my own experiences,” said Karen Guo (12), an IB candidate whose parents both came to the United States from China. However, despite the beneficial international approach the curriculum gives students. the IB system at Lindbergh is not as helpful as many students think it will be when it comes to college.

“I think the work grinds away at your soul,” ~ Justine Gacho, 12 ~ “I think what a lot of IB students find is, speaking to them after graduation, that they think it’s a waste of time because half of these universities don’t take the IB credits. I knew that coming in so maybe I just hated myself,” joked Gacho, speaking about how IB tends to not help diploma receivers in their higher education. On top of the lack of support IB gives its diploma recipients in college, the A Look into the IB Diploma JESSIE HENSEL Staff Writer

intense workload is often a major stressor for students. IB students will spend anywhere from four to eight hours per night on their homework, which is not good for a student’s mental health. “I think the work grinds away at your soul. I think the hardest part about it is that individually the work is not hard, but after all these years of freaking out over work, it gets to be so much, and at some point you need to learn how to ask for help and that you don’t have to spend every single night getting stressed [and] sick over all this work because it’s not worth it,” said Gacho. After learning all of the hardships that IB candidates go through, one question remains: Is it all worth it? “IB is worth it for me. It has gotten me many scholarships and has really helped me increase my global awareness. The work is tough and it’s a lot of stress but it is still valuable to me,” said Daria Nastasia (12).

IB Diploma Requirements - Complete all aspects in the core; write an extended essay of 4,000 words, take the Theory of Knowlege class, show creativity, activity, and service - Complete IB English, an IB social studies course, IB mathematics, IB science, and an IB second language - Choose a sixth IB subject to study from the category of arts and electives -Complete at least 3 higher level IB tests

Behind the Cloud of Smoke

A look inside the complex issue of federal marijuana legalization

AMELIA MEANS Staff Writer

14 Feature 3.23.20 This new year marked an important date in Illinois’ legislative history. On January 1, 2020, Illinois began recreational sales of marijuana, after legalizing medicinal sales in 2013. With recreational legalization talk in Missouri, and the first medical dispensaries set to open in the spring, according to St. Louis Public Radio, there are many unresolved issues associated with legalization. Lindbergh health teacher Atom Zuniga answered a few questions regarding the topic of recent and foreshadowed marijuana legalization. Zuniga discussed two of the most common concerns related to legalization of the drug: recurring health issues and possible exposure of minors. “People need to be fully knowledgeable on this substance before consuming,” Zuniga said of his biggest concern. “While there was a lot of misinformation being spread [about marijuana] ...some of those side effects are very real...While it does not possess the physically addicting factors of other schedule 1 drugs, like cocaine or heroin, it is still psychologically addictive, and you can still develop respiratory issues. It can be very detrimental to people who suffer from mental illness since it is a psychoactive substance,” Zuniga said. The need to be more fully knowledgeable about marijuana is also often an argument against its legalization, at least in the short term. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden even said more is needed on determining whether or not it was a “gateway drug,” according to USA Today. His stance is similar to that of D.A.R.E., a program designed to help keep students off drugs and alcohol. The program, which long believed that marijuana was a gateway drug, now states on their website that “more research [needs] to be done,” (D.A.R.E.). So why isn’t this research being done? Simply put, because federally it was considered more dangerous than meth and as dangerous as heroin being classified as a schedule I narcotic up until 2012, and any research conducted on the drug was intensely regulated and costly, according to an article published in the New York Times.

That fact put together with the longtime stigma of marijuana being associated with more dangerous activities such as violence and crime, as presented on DrugWarFacts.com, makes it much harder to reeducate people. But, advocates for legalization are attempting to change these stereotypes. “In several respects, even sugar poses more of a threat to our nation’s health than pot,” said Dr. David L Nathan, a clinical psychiatrist and president of Doctors for Cannabis Regulation: a group of pediatricians and health professionals that advocate for marijuana legalization, citing a 2012 study in his CNN op-ed the next year. This isn’t to say the substance is harmless. Advocates against legalising marijuana support the argument that if federalized legally, the nation’s youth will be over exposed to a substance that can be addictive and increase one’s symptoms of mental illness as in a poll conducted by Pew Research Center. The statistics gathered by the Youth Risk Behaviour Survey showed that in states that legalized marijuana recreationally, the number of teenagers who reported consuming the drug decreased. Doctors have hypothesized about why this may be, and one theory is that parents are taking extra precautions in educating their children, as well as that it is harder for teens to acquire marijuana because of dispensaries putting dealers out of business and age verification laws accoring an article published by CNN. Per Zuniga, marijuana is a psychoactive substance that can be mentally addicting. Forty percent of Americans are suspected to show symptoms of anxiety disorder alone, according to Time Magazine, and those suffering from anxiety and other fairly common mental illnesses may have their symptoms worsened with using the substance. Studies done by the CDC showed that around six people a day die from alcohol poisoning, around 88,000 a year. Conversely, no one in the United States has ever died of a marijuana overdose. U.S. Representative Steve Cohen phrased

it at a hearing in 2014 as “people don’t smoke marijuana and beat up their wives and girlfriends.” However, 40% of all violent crimes are committed under the influence of alcohol, according to the American Alcohol Addiction Center. Despite this, every 37 seconds in the United States, someone is placed in handcuffs for possession of marijuana, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). The ACLU also states that nine out of ten adults in America don’t support jail time for possessing and using small amounts of marijuana. The enforcement of these laws is taxing the government a significant amount. Just incarcerating marijuana offenders costs $600 million annually, according to the New York Times. The total spent which would include the costs of police, judicial and legal expenses is estimated to be at least nearly $2 billion annually. Federally legalizing the drug would save the government money with less annual arrests for marijuana charges, along with tax revenue from sales. Cannabis analytics company New Frontier even suggests the federal legalization will generate over $130 billion in tax revenue by 2025. Money from marijuana sales has been used to generate revenue towards homelessness programs and major funding for public schools in Colorado, where use is legal. There was also a decrease in crime noticed in areas once dispensaries were opened, contributing to that is the increased security and pedestrians walking around, according to the Chicago Sun Times. But, as Zuniga pointed out, with new legalizations comes additional concerns, especially regarding people’s safety. “If it were to be legalized, it would need to be regulated and monitored and restricted in order to insure people aren’t abusing the drug, minors do not have access to it and those who do choose to consume are doing so responsibly,” said Zuniga.

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