The International Schools Review Forum

In your experience at your international school, which qualities, experience, and certifications are schools looking for when they fill a DP Coordinator position?

Organization
Ability to work with others
Already fully versed in the DP rules and regs for all subjects and exams and registrations and everything
Preferably experienced as DP Coordinator
Definitely DP experience as a teacher
Existing relationship with the IB - personal contacts to call on in a pinch
Able to see different ways to solve the same issue
Hard working, willing to put in the hours
Attention to detail

For a start..,.

From my view of a friend who is a DP coordinator

an ungodly amount of patience
sense of humor

As a current DP coordinator, I agree with the above, but would add:

Being able to work with adults (parents and students) has been the most eye-opening part of the job. Most of the teachers I work with are amazing, but many things in the DP world are deadline specific and protocal heavy. Certain teachers, a DP coordinator needs to figure this out very quickly, need persistent and ongoing support to meet these requirements.

Additionally, in my position (not working in an IS, but large American high school) any reform or change that I want to take on will only be successful if others want to join me and value the cause. I have no "authority" which is part of the fun, quite honestly, but a very different paradigm from that of an upper level admin.

If the school has an MYP, a working knowledge of that program would be essential. Espcially given that there are massive changes coming in 2014.

Lastly, a question. How hard would it be to break into the IS circuit as a DP coordinator (at a respectable school)? I feel I meet many of the requirements in the previous responses. My family includes two young children and my wife is an MYP/DP math teacher with 12 years experience (all at the same school and 10 in IB). From reading this site, she appears to be the "golden" ticket (and IMHO is an amazing teacher), and I would be happy to teach full time and possibly work into a position in the future. Just thought I would ask

1) An in depth understanding of the IB including the MYP.

2) Being well liked and respected. Most of the difficult part in my experience was working with teachers who were not adaptive to the technical aspects of the IB. A lot of process occurs outside the view of the classroom.

3) Definitely not having any authority. You are entirely dependent on voluntary cooperation. You need to get people to do things and see your way with social skills.

4) Being able to see in the future. DP is short, 2 years and many schools start reviewing for exams in March, and students are usually focused on their essay starting when they come back from mid year break. Thats really a very short time for a program. You have to be able to picture where your going to be months in advance because by the time your "there" its too late to do anything, you dont have time.