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There is exciting news on our Pasadena campus: EF Academy is officially an International Baccalaureate World School, making us the first boarding high school in the Los Angeles region to offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Programme for students in grades 11 and 12.
It’s an important milestone for our school, but even more importantly, it gives our students another opportunity to shape an academic experience around who they are, how they learn, and where they hope to go next.
The IB Diploma Programme is recognized by leading universities in the United States and around the world for its rigorous academics, emphasis on independent learning, and global perspective. Through the programme, students strengthen the research, writing, analysis, communication, and critical-thinking skills that will serve them in university and well beyond.
For EF Academy, IB also feels like a natural fit.
Our students come from across the United States and around the world to live and learn together in Pasadena. Every day, they encounter different perspectives, cultures, languages, and experiences – not just in the classroom, but over meals in Cena dining hall, in after-school clubs, on the athletic field competing in a variety of CIF level sports, and throughout campus life.
We believe that EF Academy helps students become more curious, more confident in their own ideas, and more open to the perspectives of others. They learn to ask thoughtful questions, think critically about complex issues, and engage authentically with the world around them.
Those qualities are also at the heart of an IB education.
The IB Diploma Programme gives students a rigorous academic framework in which to deepen their inquiry, strengthen their critical thinking, and develop the agility, agency, and intercultural understanding they need to navigate an increasingly connected world. It also challenges students to connect what they are learning with the local and global issues they care about.
More choice for EF Academy students
Adding the IB Diploma Programme is an expansion of our academic offerings, not a replacement for our existing pathways.
EF Academy Pasadena will continue to offer our High School Diploma with Advanced Placement courses. Students can choose the academic pathway that best aligns with their goals, strengths, interests, and learning style.
For students who choose IB, that means joining a programme recognized by more than 4,500 universities across more than 110 countries and territories. For all EF Academy students, it means being part of a school where academic rigor is paired with the opportunity to learn alongside people whose experiences may be very different from their own.
Preparing students for life beyond borders
Since EF Academy was founded, our mission has been rooted in a simple idea: education can help break down barriers of language, culture, and geography.
Our Pasadena campus brings that idea to life every day. Students collaborate and grow alongside classmates from around the world, developing a sense of interconnectedness and a mindset that is open, curious, and eager to engage.
Becoming an IB World School strengthens our ability to deliver on that mission. It also connects Pasadena even more deeply with EF Academy’s global network, including our campuses in New York and Oxford.
Since 2009, EF Academy has graduated thousands of students who have gone on to colleges and universities around the world. With the addition of the IB Diploma Programme in Pasadena, we are giving the next generation of EF Academy students even more choice in how they prepare for that future.
We are incredibly excited to bring IB to our students and families, and we are proud to introduce this globally recognized academic pathway to the boarding school community here in Los Angeles.