Sep 28, 2026 · 26 min · 10 segments
Send us Fan Mail What does the growth of IB in India tell us about the opportunities—and challenges—of bringing IB philosophy into different…
Gayathri MehtaGuestJon PetersonHost
The biggest or the first thing to understand about India is that there isn't one Indian education system.
We have the Central Board of Secondary Education, ICSE, and then we have international curriculum like the A-levels and IB.
And even within all of these, there's a lot of, I would say, urban-rural divide.
So the educational experience in a way of a student in a private school in Mumbai or Delhi or Bangalore or Chandigarh, for that matter, is completely different from that of a student in kind of a rural government school.
But I think it is a mistake which we often speak about in our workshops and PD in schools as well.
that you cannot describe Indian education simply as traditional versus progressive.
There are some very, very innovative government schools and Indian state boards, and educators are doing, of course, extraordinary work across, just as there can be very traditional private schools with very high fees.
And I think what also... could be a significant point here if you think about if you take a bird's eye view of education in india is that india of course academic achievement is very important for most students so when you when you have a system like the ib which says that we want students to question and you have a tok and an extended essay and a lot of times it is a risk as well because it is a challenging curriculum So it's exciting to see how parents take that in a lot of, or students take that in a lot of places because they want academic achievement.
it's always dangerous or risky, I should say, to paint a culture in a single brush or whatever.
But I think in general, there is this impression in India that parents are very on top of their child's education and have high expectations.
And I've spoken to a lot of students in India, and I've gotten the impression that they definitely have parents that are behind the scenes making sure that they are doing the most challenging thing they can.
But did you allude, if I'm hearing between the lines of what you were saying, is that because IB has this kind of multiple perspectives and things, that might be a challenge for Indian parents to accept that?
I think more than multiple perspectives, it's the idea of students here to being very focused on what they're going to do after school.
So one thing about the idea is the kind of international mobility it gives, it gives the students that they do want, they do want, a lot of students do want to go abroad, they do want apply to the best of the universities around the world especially kids in a lot of these private schools so yeah and Indian parents are also very future oriented so they understand that a curriculum like the IB where it might be challenging it might focus on multiple perspectives but it is also making them future it's making them ready to go to different countries around the world and And of course, the IB does inherently, I think the curriculum itself does make them confident, make students confident communicators.
So yeah, I think that the danger of this is saying that we want to send a child to the IB because the child should go somewhere abroad or the child should apply in different countries.
make them more ready and more mobile in different countries around the world so yeah
The biggest or the first thing to understand about India is that there isn't one Indian education system.
We have the Central Board of Secondary Education, ICSE, and then we have international curriculum like the A-levels and IB.
And even within all of these, there's a lot of, I would say, urban-rural divide.
So the educational experience in a way of a student in a private school in Mumbai or Delhi or Bangalore or Chandigarh, for that matter, is completely different from that of a student in kind of a rural government school.
But I think it is a mistake which we often speak about in our workshops and PD in schools as well.
that you cannot describe Indian education simply as traditional versus progressive.
There are some very, very innovative government schools and Indian state boards, and educators are doing, of course, extraordinary work across, just as there can be very traditional private schools with very high fees.
And I think what also... could be a significant point here if you think about if you take a bird's eye view of education in india is that india of course academic achievement is very important for most students so when you when you have a system like the ib which says that we want students to question and you have a tok and an extended essay and a lot of times it is a risk as well because it is a challenging curriculum So it's exciting to see how parents take that in a lot of, or students take that in a lot of places because they want academic achievement.
it's always dangerous or risky, I should say, to paint a culture in a single brush or whatever.
But I think in general, there is this impression in India that parents are very on top of their child's education and have high expectations.
And I've spoken to a lot of students in India, and I've gotten the impression that they definitely have parents that are behind the scenes making sure that they are doing the most challenging thing they can.
But did you allude, if I'm hearing between the lines of what you were saying, is that because IB has this kind of multiple perspectives and things, that might be a challenge for Indian parents to accept that?
I think more than multiple perspectives, it's the idea of students here to being very focused on what they're going to do after school.
So one thing about the idea is the kind of international mobility it gives, it gives the students that they do want, they do want, a lot of students do want to go abroad, they do want apply to the best of the universities around the world especially kids in a lot of these private schools so yeah and Indian parents are also very future oriented so they understand that a curriculum like the IB where it might be challenging it might focus on multiple perspectives but it is also making them future it's making them ready to go to different countries around the world and And of course, the IB does inherently, I think the curriculum itself does make them confident, make students confident communicators.
So yeah, I think that the danger of this is saying that we want to send a child to the IB because the child should go somewhere abroad or the child should apply in different countries.
make them more ready and more mobile in different countries around the world so yeah
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