Aspen School District Receives Official IB Authorization for Elementary School

The Aspen School District will begin the 2024-2025 academic year as a fully-integrated International Baccalaureate district, the first in the state.

ASD leaders were notified of the official authorization for its primary years programme at Aspen Elementary School in July, after an IB organization official who evaluated the school’s PYP framework at the end of the school year said AES was beyond expectations in a verification visit. The Aspen Times reported in June that the district was on pace to become the first, fully-integrated IB district in Colorado as the district awaited final approval from the IB organization.

“We believe that a high-quality curriculum should be given to every student and they should have access to that,” said Superintendent Tharyn Mulberry in a news release. “We are very excited that we will be one of the first school districts in the country to be a fully integrated and aligned IB school district.”

The elementary school was the last piece of the puzzle in making ASD a full IB district. Aspen Middle School received authorization for the middle years programme in 2023, and Aspen High School received authorization for the diploma programme in 2001. ASD joins only a handful of districts in the country that offer IB curriculum to every student in pre-kindergarten-12th grade. 

Several districts across the state have multiple schools that offer PYP, MYP, or DP curriculum. Discovery Canyon Campus — a pre-kindergarten-12th grade school in the Academy School District 20 in Colorado Springs — is the only school with a full IB curriculum in the state, but the district itself does not have full authorization for all of its schools. 

The IB educational framework aims to develop inquiring, knowledgeable, and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect.

After receiving final authorization, former PYP Coordinator Harpreet Mehta took over the role as the district’s director of IB continuum and student learning. After helping the elementary school receive its authorization, she will now work with the IB coordinators in each school.

“We have great teachers who are passionate about what they do in the classroom,” she said in the news release. “Aspen Elementary School teachers are really caring and really involved and they create and trigger that curiosity of students. Our students have the right conditions to be able to prepare themselves for the new global economy and the evolving canvas.”

By: Lucy Peterson I The Aspen Times I August 9, 2024