IB economics - Paper 3 Policy Recommendation? PETIT

One of the greatest and simultaneously most tricky parts of writing IB exams is that your answer will be assessed against a given - and very clear - set of criteria. You might show great understanding of the impacts of a given policy, but if you do not include information from the text in your policy recommendation, for instance, its over. No 7 for you. 

Do not get me wrong. I instantly fell in love with IB when I first saw the rubrics and I am sure it is the magic solution for ensuring fair grades when you have thousands of students papers to mark. 

But while we love it, how can we expect students to remember how to write answers for each command term in two or three papers, and across different subjects? Moreover, as rubrics change, how to make sure that students from the first cohort are not penalized as teachers and students are still making themselves familiar with the new syllabus?

One major change from the IB Economics syllabus that will first be assessed in 2022 are the ones of Paper 3. Broadly known as the "calculations paper", Paper 3 still includes some calculations, but not with exclusivity, as these can also be asked for in Paper 2, and it also asks for a policy recommendation! 

IB economics teachers were lucky enough to have few command terms to cover (in Business and Management, for instance, they are 10 times more diverse!). For explain you need the DEED (now without one of the Es), for evaluate, you need to CLASPP. But what about to recommend a policy?

Well, even if I don't have the answers for all the questions I posed, there is something interesting about the policy recommendation rubrics that might help you (and your students). The criteria says that you need to identify a policy, use information from the specific case discussed in the paper, use theory and terms, and evaluate implications. In other words, PETIT. En plus, the given amount of lines to write the answer is is surprisingly small compared to what we are used to in evaluate (paper 1 b) answers. In short, it matches. 

Feel free to download the image below to use with your students or to write me an email if you want it with a higher quality.

Going back to the 10k-criteria point, I think one important take away from the changes in the rubrics is that the new IB economics syllabus wants in-context, focused answers. The criticism to the one-size-fits-all approach sometimes seen in international organizations in the past has arrived to IB economics. Paper 1 answer must be based on real live examples given by the student, Paper 2 answers must be focused on information provided by the article or the table, and Paper 3 policy recommendation should be focused on the case being analyzed (and information gained throughout the paper). 

I hope this helps and I am looking forward to your opinion!

You might also be interested in other material I have prepared related to exam skills for passing IB economics papers - specifically guidance on how to write a Paper 1 or Paper 2. 

Or, you want teaching material focusing on the new IB syllabus - Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, or The Global Economy. 

And I have some material focusing on IB Business and Management resources.