What was your original thinking about the IBDP and transition into grade 11?

I originally knew I wanted to do biology as an HL, however, I was wondering between doing 2 science HL’s or a science and economics. I kind of knew what subjects I wanted to take for my other groups, for example in Group 1 English, Group 2 Chinese SL, Group 3 Biology, and Group 4 Economics. Group 6 – either taking Music or doing chemistry, and either taking lang lit or lit was the hardest choice for me.

As my brother had gone through this a few years ago, he helped me out by giving me advice on how to choose a balanced choice and explained to me how the subjects were like. For example, he strongly advised me to take HL maths as it would become very useful when choosing universities and majors. Overall, I think from the help of my brother, my original thoughts IBDP was not as scary and intimidating as I already had enough exposure to the whole concept.

From the start, I had interests in going to a liberal arts college, so I wasn’t that stressed about prerequisites and compulsory subjects. However, right now I’m interested in doing something science-based, so I thought it was important I took at least one science as an HL.

How has this thinking changed over time? What are you thinking about now?

I discussed with my brother and I asked the teachers about how SL music and what HL chemistry was going to have, and from hearing that music was purely going to be based on performance was the biggest factor for me. Now I have decided to choose Chemistry instead as it would open more career paths, and I enjoy it quite a lot. I chose Literature in the end as I talked to many people and saw their perspective on the subjects, and found that literature for now aligned most with myself. I’m not 100 percent sure about my choice for lit, so I might change my mind after I talk to the UAC.

How have the G11 students talks, Alumni talks, transition website, talking to teachers… helped your thinking?

The G11 talks helped me to see what the arts subject will have, and see what is a good balanced choice. It gave me a bit of relief to know that most of them did not know what they wanted to do as a career in the future, so I wasn’t as stressed about choosing my subjects. I talked to a few of my friends in Grade 11 about literature, and what were the good and bad parts of it. They talked to me about how they chose their subjects, and why it did/didn’t suit them.

For the alumni talks, I went to the talk for Media and for Pharmaceutical healthcare. After I listened to both, I thought that pharmaceutical healthcare was interesting, but the start of her career – working in labs, was something I wouldn’t want to do. For Media, it seemed that she was really passionate about her job, and you need a lot of social connections to develop your career, which would probably be a challenge for me.

Overall, I’m really excited to move towards IB and meet my UAC.

Update after talking to UAC

I have decided to change my subjects from Chemistry to Music. The main reason was that after thinking about my HL choices, I felt that a lot of work and effort was needed, and there wasn’t much areas to show my creative side – so I thought it would be a good balance if I took Music. I was a bit worried that my career and university options were going to be limited, but I made up my mind that I would not go down the medicine path, so I confirmed my change to music.