PenDragon - the official magazine of Lyford Cay International School PenDragon Vol 5, Spring 2019 | Page 16

“
Going to a school like Yale
can be pretty overwhelming
because everyone is so smart.
The IB gave me a measure of
confidence, which was really
helpful because a large
part of being successful at
a competitive school is being
sure of yourself.”
Thinking Differently:
How an IB Education Prepared Issa Saunders for Ivy League Success
By Taige J Adderley, Communications Coordinator
Every year, Lyford Cay International School (LCIS)
graduates go on to attend top colleges and universities
around the world. For Issa Saunders (LCIS Class of 2011,
Yale Class of 2015), the International Baccalaureate
(IB) curriculum at LCIS was the starting point for a
number of academic and career successes. She
graduated from Yale and went to work in management
for an e-commerce company in the US. She recently
gained admittance to the prestigious Wharton School
of Business at the University of Pennsylvania in pursuit
of an MBA/Master’s Degree in International Studies.
The IB programme has gained acclaim globally
for its rigorous academics and the confidence
it engenders in its students. LCIS graduate, Issa
Saunders, knows firsthand the value of an IB
education.
Graduating with an IB diploma from LCIS
primed Issa for success in life and helped her
to gain access to top-tier tertiary opportunities.
“I applied to ten schools, six of which were Ivy
League, I was accepted to nine of them.” Among
her offers was a full scholarship to Johns Hopkins
University, one of the top-ranked schools in the
United States. She also received a National Merit
Scholarship and a scholarship from the Lyford
Cay Foundation.
While LCIS’s academics gave Issa an advantage
when applying for admission to college, she
credits her IB education for helping her with
an often-overlooked aspect of applying for
competitive universities: interviewing. “I think
the introspective and reflective aspects of
the IB prepare you to present yourself well for
these opportunities. In my case, that may have
mattered more than the actual IB diploma.”
LCIS also boasts a number of co-curricular
activities, electives and sports teams that extend
learning beyond the classroom. Issa cites her
participation in these programmes as one of the
reasons she was able to gain acceptance to as
many top-tier universities as she did, saying, “In
order to gain acceptance to Ivy League schools,
you have to show that you’re well-rounded, and
I was always involved in many co-curricular
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Issa, who had already learned Spanish and
French at LCIS, then decided to put her career
on hold to learn a fourth language. Wanting
her fourth language to be one that was not
a romance language and did not have Latin
script, she chose Arabic. Having fallen in love
with Jordan while on vacation visiting friends,
she decided that it would be an ideal place
to study and became particularly fond of
Jordanian dialect (formal Arabic differs from
conversational Arabic and dialects differ by
region). Since completing her course in Arabic
in March, she has moved back to the US. In
May she started Wharton, where she will earn a
Joint MBA and Master’s Degree in International
Studies.
activities, including being the founding Vice
President of the InterAct Service Club and
President the next year.”
At Yale, Issa received her Bachelor’s degree
in Political Science. The academic rigour of
the IB exams and Extended Essay gave her
the confidence to thrive in a competitive
environment, “Going to a school like Yale can
be pretty overwhelming because everyone
is so smart. The IB gave me a measure
of confidence, which was really helpful
because a large part of being successful at a
competitive school is being sure of yourself.”
After university, Issa went to work for a
healthcare consultancy firm in Washington,
DC. Shortly after, she was offered an
opportunity to expand the horizons of her
young career and step into a more challenging
management role at McMaster-Carr, an
e-commerce company in Ohio, a challenge
that she eagerly accepted.
Wherever Issa goes after graduate school, she
will take the lessons learned from her time at LCIS
and the benefits of the IB with her. “Even today,
the confidence I gained at LCIS allows me to take
on risks that I wouldn’t have otherwise considered
taking. It taught me to think differently.”
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