Decolonise IB: How international school alumni are mobilising to diversify the expat curriculum
10/8/2020 Update: Decolonise IB has changed its name to Organisation to Decolonise International Schools (ODIS) to include international schools that teach programs besides International Baccalaureate. Our website provides links to our latest podcasts, panels and articles.
International schools — the postcard of an idealised education. Well-lit classrooms with smartboards; readily available equipment still fresh in its packaging; selected teachers with frequent professional training and stimulating salaries; students of all colours from across the globe, children of the world’s elite.
Or something like that. As someone who’s attended seven international schools over the course of her childhood all over the Global South, I can affirm with some amusement that I am indoctrinated in the ways of the international baccalaureate, one of the most renowned programs in the expat-kid world (though also widely offered in local public schools in countries such as the US). I non-ironically hail to the glossy terms highlighted in the IB framework — global-mindedness, critical thinking.
But I am young, and only beginning to understand how this schooling often results in a kind of intellectual navel-gazing. Many of us have studied the textbook-standard topics of the Western world: the French Revolution, the Enlightenment, World War II.
But how is it that my friend Ochieng grew up in an international school in Kenya, and never learned any Kenyan history? How often have I learned something vital about a country I lived in, years after I had left it? How often did we as international students feel unrepresented in the course topics that were assigned to us? And how many of us, upon the death of George Floyd, felt the jolt of realisation that we know nothing about systemic racism, colonialism and its undiscussed modern successor?
The issue is a complex one. Our recent investigations have made this apparent. As our newsfeed and consciousness flooded with news of the Black Lives Matter protests in the U.S., my friend Clara suggested we create a petition to require more diversity in the International Baccalaureate syllabus.
We created surveys for educators and students. We made social media accounts. We started getting responses, lots of them. Decolonise IB emerged, with similar initiatives springing up simultaneously around the expat world and forming a growing network. In the two weeks since we’ve launched the petition, our views on the international education system have shifted drastically.
“We realize that [our school] is not unique at all — this apathetic response to anti-racism is actually a widespread issue across many international schools”
- Tiffany Shi, International School of Beijing Alumni for Anti-Racism.
With over 400 responses our student survey results are clear: for a baccalaureate that calls itself ‘international’, many pupils and alumni felt that their education was highly Western and White. Class content left the majority feeling uneducated on Black history, White privilege, systemic oppression, and generally any affairs pertaining to Black/Indigenous/People Of Colour. Not to mention matters concerning women, disabled people, refugees and the LGBTQIA+ community. International students are not exempt from feeling their education has often centred on the contributions of able-bodied cisgender straight White men. Our own culture and race often has little place in formal class discussions. “We are very much a flag, food and festivals administration,” one teacher wrote, but outside special events schools might provide little opportunity for the student body to celebrate its diversity.
What a waste, when our students’ voices are such a powerful tool, especially at a time where the world needs to see solidarity among typically divided cultures. We need just as much to expose ourselves to the ‘real world’- having been (though I can’t speak for all of us) raised in our “Colour Blind” bubbles, as Rachel Engels astutely points out.
I cannot speak for international schools teaching British or US programs. But the IB, which we focused on given our experience and access to it, is a very loosely defined curriculum. Schools are essentially autonomous and the syllabus design mainly comes down to the teachers. Most of whom are White and North-American or West-European, raised by the systems that movements like Black Lives Matter are trying to dismantle.
The fact that the IB is so flexible is what makes it so wonderfully adaptable to each school, and that freedom is not used to its full advantage. There are excellent teachers in the IB, many of whom want to diversify the syllabus. Some schools may have an expanded curriculum that properly reflects the student body, but a completely segregated staff. One teacher told us about such a school that provided ongoing Professional Development on inclusivity, international literature in English class and a strong Mother Tongue module in the Primary Years Program. Yet in this African country the school board and staff (including Heads of Department and counselors) were predominantly White, with White teachers having meals under the “White tree” and mostly excluding BIPOC teachers from communal out-of-school activities.
“Black teachers feel undermined, especially the [Teacher Assistants], many of whom are highly qualified but see no future in the school,”
- Anonymous response to teacher survey
Trends of racism in the recruitment system are increasingly being discussed. Many teachers described their school board as passive, or open and encouraging towards framework diversity but never proactive. This needs to be a collective effort, from teachers to administration, to the client — parents.
Our families have skewed the business that way. There is such adulation of the Western world across the Global South; international schools need a conspicuous number of Western teachers to be deemed desirable by the local elite. Parents dream of sending their children to Ivy League schools, to Oxford and Cambridge. They want their kids to internalise Whiteness as a standard. The denigration of our own cultures has been going on for so long, and enforces the narrative of Western superiority.
“It’s not enough for it to pay lip service through using carefully placed “buzz words” and the arbitrary provision of tick boxes that schools use to appear “inclusive.” The systemic racism at international schools needs to be stamped down and rooted out.”
- Anonymous response to teacher survey
Aside from lack of action there is also the issue of censorship — that of very relevant political conflicts in the host country, for one (China evidently comes to mind first). But also deliberate censorship by schools themselves; why would Ochieng’s school teach Kenya’s history of colonisation by the English, when the school itself was founded by and still caters to English diplomats? Why would a school in Turkmenistan discuss American involvement in the Iraq War, when children of the U.S. military are in that very classroom, directly because of similar interests in the region? Even schools with more diverse teaching programs skirt around such topics. And why wouldn’t they? Admitting that international schools serve a colonial function? That’s just bad publicity.
The best course of action for students and alumni now is to act on a local level, petitioning your school boards for change. Schools in China, Singapore, and the Philippines have formed teams with the hashtag #decolonise[school name] and tagging us so we may broadcast their efforts to the expat student community. We’ve had a number of thought-provoking Zoom conferences. Apart from promoting this work, further expanding our network and in the near future creating examples of lesson proposals, we’re hoping to contact the IB directly. Change will likely not come just from the top down; we must work from the bottom up and push them to meet us in the middle.
International schools concern only a privileged minority. We are the 7% globally mobile international students, rubbing elbows if not intersecting with the infamous 1% wealthiest people on the planet. Changing expat education may not affect a large percentage of the population, but it will condition future CEOs, diplomats and politicians who might someday make important decisions.
My education challenged me to do more than memorise and regurgitate facts. So I maintain that the IB taught me to research critically, question common biases and formulate my own opinions. What’s ironic is that this has backfired on the international education system as a generation of students looks back and notices the gaping holes in our not-so-global curriculum. We have not been equipped, intellectually or emotionally, to understand this world and its current crises, and more importantly, our position in upholding global racial capitalism. Our maps are distorted. Our education makes us complicit. If we want to use the platform of international schools to its full potential, to truly advance justice, equity, and global-mindedness, our community needs to recast its long outdated mould.
By Xoài David
Sign the Decolonise IB Petition, take our Student and Educator surveys, and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Decolonise IB is currently affiliated with KDSL Global, the Association of International Educators and Leaders of Colour (AIELOC) and Linden Global Learning Support as well as alumni from the following schools: Shanghai American School, Shanghai United International School, Hong Kong International School, International School Beijing, International School Manila, Brent International School, Tashkent International School, Singapore American School, International School Bangkok, Jakarta International School, Sekolah Ciputra, American International School of Bucharest, American Community School Athens, Tashkent International School, Lincoln Community School (Ghana) and Bilkent Laboratory International School, Berlin Brandenburg International School.
Thanks to Clara Reynolds, Kelindah Schuster and B. Kim for edits.
Disclaimer: Decolonise IB in no way seeks to appropriate Black Lives Matter nor divert urgent attention from causes that require immediate social and material support.
