The MYP is a five-year program that typically begins at age 11 and is completed by 16. Pipkin Middle School offers years 1-3 of the MYP and Central High School offers years 4-5. The MYP offers students a challenging series of courses that connect their studies with real-world issues and circumstances.  At Pipkin Middle School, the MYP is implemented as the International Baccalaureate Organization intended: inclusive of all students with a wide array of interests and academic abilities. 

Pipkin Middle School promotes active learning, international-mindedness, and empathetic thinking. Students at Pipkin engage in activities that promote thinking creatively, critically, and reflectively so they can make the world a better place.

Students interact with global issues such as food shortages and develop ideas into plans--which become action.

Hana Kurtz's class measures potential space for a garden.

Pipkin Middle School and the International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme allow students to have a more active role in shaping their education, including what they learn, how they learn it, and what they research or study for projects and papers. MYP students frequently collaborate with MYP teachers and their MYP peers to create unique learning experiences tailored to their specific interests and goals. Students who struggle to feel engaged by typical classroom teaching strategies often thrive in the unique approaches to learning and teaching that include inquiry, concept-driven, hands-on real-world projects.

MYP is not a curriculum, but a set of frameworks that focuses on critical thinking, reading, and project-based learning that encourages student inquiry. The program provides students with a global perspective by exposing them to people and cultures from around the world and allows students to make connections between what they are learning in the classroom, their personal lives, and global society as a whole. The MYP philosophy becomes visible through the Learner Profiles and Approaches to Learning. This focus strengthens learning strategies and encourages academic and personal growth. MYP units are inquiry-based, and assignments are graded using the IB rubric scoring criterion. At the end of each quarter, students receive a report card with grades based on IB Criterion Rubrics that then is converted to a local grade A-F. At the end of the school year, the student cumulative learning is communicated using a 7-point overall scale that includes descriptors of student learning depth and breadth. 

Students are empowered and prepared to develop personal responsibility in order to be positive, productive members of society, and own their education by engaging in critical and creative thinking.