International Baccalaureate (IB) was created with the aim of developing intercultural understanding and respect. It helps people cross the cognitive and physical barriers of language, country and culture. These barriers are crossed in aid of developing interpersonal skills which promote cohesion between learners and allows overall character development, which leads to passionate life long learners that find the methods through which you learn just as important as the curriculum you are taught. IB also allows for those involved in the program to build confidence to achieve goals through a range of learning contexts, meaning that learning takes place outside of the classroom as well as inside of it. This once again aids in character development and teaches those involved how to thrive in a deeply complex world.

This links with my own beliefs about education through the belief that it develops a sense of cross community relations. As I am from Northern Ireland, cross community aspects have been heavily involved in my education as a method to remove the stigma and dogma around Protestantism and Catholicism. I believe that people are similar in many ways, however they choose to see what divides them rather than these similarities. In my teaching I would like to foster an outlook and approach that we should work towards cohesion rather than  boundaries between learners. IB promotes this through its intercultural understanding and I hope this module will aid me further in this aim for my own teaching.