Teaching was never a question for Hurons Diploma Program and Career Program facilitator.
“I was one of those kids that always wanted to be a teacher,” said Carrie James.
That road soon led to Bloomfield Hills, James’s first teaching position in 1999. Nine years later the district decided to make the change into the International Baccalaureate program, or the IB program.
“[They] decided to take on IB, as their identity of the school,” James said.
Up till then, James served as the social studies chair, the implementation of IB provided a new avenue. With a masters degree in curriculum and instruction, the draw to IB was fitting,
“I’m a very organized and planned person and being able to visualize the whole curriculum and helping people with their instruction was definitely right in my skill set,” James said.
She started as an MYP (Middle Years Program) coordinator, staying on the IB path she eventually became a DP coordinator for Bloomfield Hills High school, about 28 minutes out of Ann Arbor.
“I launched MYP there, picked up the [Diploma Programme], and then I came here,” James said.
Her ambition to continue with an IB involved career mode, moving to Huron a difficult choice.
“I loved it there, I was there for 18 years, [had] my closest friend, I grew up there,” said James. “I was twenty two years old. I grew up with those people so it was really hard to leave.”
Despite the difficulties, the bold brave new step to move to Huron was fueled by the creation of the DP and CP programmes in Ann Arbor Public Schools. In the Spring of 2017 Mitchelle Elementary, Scarlett Middle School and Huron became IB world schools. James was interested in the high school Career Program, an exploration and career specific curriculum through high school.
“The CP was so interesting,” James said. “I came here to start to build that program.”
So “start it” she did. James built the CP programme from the ground up, serving as AAPS’s first CP coordinator. When COVID-19 hit in 2020 and budget cuts were made, James was placed James into the role of DP coordinator. Rather than worry about the responsibility that followed being in charge of the IB program at Huron, James embraced the leadership, celebrating and advocating for what makes IB at Huron special. The near most important section of the DP and CP program is accessibility.
“I was so attracted to come to [the] Ann Arbor IB program because the philosophy that anyone can do IB, stereotypically IB is rigorous, [and] selective,” James said. “There have been very few barriers in my time here, things like the students don’t have to pay for exams.”
To maintain this accessibility, James sits on the board of IB leaders for schools in Michigan.
“I do think that if they can continue eliminating more and more barriers it just gives kids more exposure and more practice on those skills that are going to be important,” said James.
In the future, James hopes that this level of commitment to including all students in the IB programmes remains an essential and important part of what Ann Arbor public schools can offer. But as she leaves this community, she looks towards a break, and a next chapter.
“One fun project that I’ve been putting off, that I want to do with one of my cousins,” James said “I want to spend a couple months with her, she has all the family pictures – I was a history major, so that historian in me [is] looking forward to doing that in the spring.”
As for the future of IB, James plans to stay involved as it remains important to her.
“I still sit on the board of IB schools of Michigan, I’ll stay on [in] that capacity,” James said. “We’ve been doing a lot of work with legislators to try to get more of the SL credit, just to get more recognition for the IB programming in the state.”
