A Spectre is Haunting Philosophy

Every year, new young bright students enter Katedralskolan. Many of them, such as yourself, have chosen this school because of the good reputation it has built for being safe, crammed with friendly fellow learners and teachers and its broad selection of programmes. One of those programmes happens to be the International Baccalaureate (IB).

The IB programme was welcomed with wide open arms in 2001, entering the family of Katte and vice versa. Suddenly, people applied for the IB thanks to it being in English and because of its depth and flexibility in choosing subjects, which allowed each potential IB student to tailor their own education based on their individual preferences. "You can study biology and philosophy at the same time? How exciting!" thinks the average potential IB student.

Unfortunately, that might not be the case next year since the school is considering to discontinue the IB Philosophy course due to financial reasons. That is a discomforting thought for future IB students seeing that an innumerable amount of Pre-DP students (first years) have chosen the IB for its wide selection of subjects and many have done so for Philosophy. The philosophy course offers a particular speculative climate not present in any other course in the entire curriculum. Students learn to comprehend, evaluate, and build on ideas, as well as how to communicate those ideas to their peers. Critical thinking and reasoning are key aspects to Philosophy, and indeed this course helps form the sort of thoughtful students the IB claims to idealise - the words "thoughtful" and “reflective” from the IBO's 'Learner Profile' come to mind. To remove one of the most subtle and introspective courses in the IB curriculum would effectively hinder students from exploring some of the greatest minds of all time, as well as their own. This is a shame given how many Pre-DP students have already chosen the course for the coming year. As of now, about twenty Pre-DP students might not have the chance to experience Philosophy. We, the IB as whole, are deeply concerned by the potential discontinuation of the course.

Help us make our voice heard by signing this petition. If Philosophy is to be cancelled next year, the pattern might continue to infect other programmes such as the natural sciences and the social sciences in the near future.

Sign this petition to say NO to the abolishment of Philosophy. Thank you for reading.



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