Ravi Velloor

Associate Editor

Back in 1948, Marie-Therese Maurette, a French teacher at the Geneva International School, was inspired by the international organisations that dotted the Swiss city to write a pedagogical piece on educational techniques for promoting peace. Two decades later, her piece would inspire others at the school to design the International Baccalaureate programme.

Now in its 50th year, International Baccalaureate – known around the world simply as IB – has expanded to some 5,000 schools. The Asia-Pacific alone has some 800, a number that grows by the year. Singapore has known of the programme since the United World College in Dover Road began offering it in 1977.

With its unique model of education that emphasises both personal and academic achievement, IB, once a programme used in senior schools, now caters to children between the ages of three and 19. Curious to learn how it is maintaining relevance in the age of artificial intelligence and the Fourth Industrial Revolution, I sat down recently for a long conversation with Dr Siva Kumari, its director-general.

A big change, she says, is that from the clubbiness of the past among IB schools around the world and their exclusivity, nations are researching the IB strategy and seeing if it can be implemented across the school system. Japan has been talking with the IB Organisation for a programme to cover all its prefectures and, more recently, so has South Korea. Jordan and Lebanon are on board.

And these in addition to IB being adopted by private providers such as Gems Education, the Dubai-headquartered company that operates some 70 schools across a dozen countries.

“It is wonderful that they are asking us without our doing a sales pitch,” says Dr Siva Kumari. “IB is very unique in saying that you cannot simply write a cheque and buy our programme. You have to study yourself (and convince us that) you have the capacity to offer IB.”

For this reason, she would not expect to see IB as mainstay curriculum anywhere – the demands it places on schools is simply too high. Rather, she says, IB will be an alternative that sits within existing systems.

She thinks Singapore had a huge influence in popularising the programme, starting with Anglo-Chinese School (Independent) becoming the first local school to offer it in 2005. Currently, IB is offered by 33 institutions across the island, including the Singapore Sports School.

“Singapore decided it needs its own citizens to be globally minded and that requires a change in curriculum,” she says, crediting the Economic Development Board for its far-sightedness. “That is how they came to IB. Obviously, they had options and I am glad they chose us.”

At first glance, Dr Siva Kumari might seem an unlikely person to be principal evangelist and administrator of a programme that stresses individual learning skills with topics such as Extended Essay, Theory of Knowledge and compulsory study of at least two languages.

The daughter of a shipping executive in India’s south-western state of Andhra Pradesh, a province whose people lay deep stress on rote education, her early grooming was to be a traditional Indian wife.

After getting her first degree, life changed for her at age 21 when she left for the United States to join the husband her parents had picked for her, an Indian physician and radiologist doing his residency in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Indeed, when her parents in India heard subsequently that she’d got a job with a counselling company and was washing her own car, they were alarmed – they’d found her a fine husband and given her a good trousseau, surely they’d done enough to provide her with a comfortable life?

Thanks to a supportive spouse, she kept going, she says, raising two children and gaining a master’s from the University of Cincinnati and a PhD in education from University of Houston. She then worked for nine years at Rice University, rising to be associate provost.

Her interest in IB rose after a study from the US National Research Council talked about the programme and compared it with the College Board’s Advanced Placement, which offers college-level curricula and examinations to high school students.

Offered the job of Singapore-based regional director for the IB Organisation’s Asia-Pacific operations, she seized the opportunity, spending a year on

the island before moving back to the US as chief operating officer for IB and eventual promotion as director-general in 2014.

In short, like the IB diploma holders she produces, Dr Siva Kumari had proven she had a mind of her own.

Fifty years into the programme and despite the swirling changes brought on by technology and machine learning, Dr Siva Kumari says IB’s relevance is undiminished because it is constructed to deal with a changing world. Interdisciplinarity helps students understand different perspectives, while extended essays build deep engagements with research subjects.

“It is a thinking child’s curriculum and parents often tell us that their children are very thoughtful,” she says. “And, as the IB has grown, we have moved from that two-year programme all the way down to three-year-olds, so we now work with the three to 19 age group. Even young children are expected to make a change.”

She cites the example of a child in Washington DC who did not like the fat content of her lunch and created a petition that persuaded the school to change the diet. In Hyderabad, India, middle school students effected real change by putting a (chargeable) cell on cycle rickshaw wheels, so the rickshaw man could get some electricity on the go.

Essentially, she says, the IB wants children to be thoughtful creators of algorithms rather than mere recipients of algorithms.

She seems on less firm ground when I point out that in many ways the IB seems still very European, with a layer of American influence thrown in. Surely Asia, too, would have influenced it in some way?

“There are some classic human values that transcend regions... the idealism of Eastern cultures of thinking of community first as opposed to the individual,” she responds. “IB, through its values, kind of engineers that kind of goodness as implicit through its programmes. Yes, it does have the individualism of the mind but I think the Eastern cultures promote that as well.”

IB, she adds, will inevitably be influenced by the East. Already, Asian teachers are involved in the curriculum construction, to cite just one instance.

Dr Siva Kumari stresses the importance of teaching the teachers, and raising their skill levels. This is important because, unlike a bachelor’s degree of three to four years or a two-year master’s programme, parents surrender the first dozen years of their kids’

education to school teachers.“I think we all have to wise up and

say that profession is fundamentally important and in fact needs to shift back to the times when education was about wisdom and building a human being, rather than being (purely about) content,” she says. “Singapore is an example to the world on how to treat teachers and students.”

At a time when digital access has the same salience for the young as food, and the device seems more important than water, it also is critical to have conversations about the correct and proper use of these tools, just as it is important to have a balanced meal and enough sleep.

Raising well-rounded children has become more important than ever before, their flexibility of mind only made possible by knowing different disciplines. In the age of an explosion of information, calmness and creativity of the mind are critical as well.

“Leaders would be short-sighted if they are prepared in just one discipline. Leadership is about balance and perspective, taking the long view.”

I ask which CEO she admires most and she comes up with Mr Satya Nadella of Microsoft, who, like her, has his origins in Andhra Pradesh, and Mr Jeff Bezos of Amazon.

Mr Nadella’s success in moving Microsoft to a multi-disciplinary organisation is unusual for a person who came up through the programming channel, she says. Likewise, Mr Bezos’ obsession with customer service also holds lessons for IB in understanding the needs of schools and responding swiftly and with depth to their needs.

Travelling out of The Hague every two weeks to a different country, running the expanding IB, Dr Siva Kumari says she doesn’t have time enough to pursue her interests such as trekking, half-marathons and mountaineering.

Once an accomplished cook, she has little time for that either.

“Actually, the roles have reversed,” she says. “My husband’s a very, very great cook!”

velloor@sph.com.sg

THE EXECUTIVE

Dr Siva Kumari is the seventh direc-tor-general of the International Baccalaureate (IB) and the first woman to hold the post. She has held it since January 2014.

Born in Visakhapatnam in India, she moved to the United States at age 21 to join her radiologist-hus-band, then doing his residency in

Cincinnati, Ohio. She is 57 years old and is currently based at The Hague in the Netherlands.

Dr Siva joined the IB in April 2009 as Singapore-based regional director for Asia-Pacific. In May 2010, she was named the first chief operating officer of the IB located in Bethesda, US, responsible for IB regions worldwide.

Earlier, she was the first asso-ciate provost for K-12 initiatives at

Rice University in Houston, Texas. In 2002, she created the Advanced Placement Digital Library for sci-ence teachers, with funding from the US National Science Founda-tion, serving as chair of the Na-tional Science Digital Library Con-ference.

She has a bachelor of science de-gree from India, a master’s from the University of Cincinnati, and a doctorate in education from the

University of Houston. Once an ardent trekking and climbing enthusiast – she has climbed Mt Kilimanjaro twice – Dr Siva and her husband have two children, a girl and a boy.

THE ORGANISATIONFounded in 1968, the IB’s mission is to create a better world through education. Its programme is now used in more than 5,000 schools

around the world. A not-for-profit organisation, the IB had a turnover of US$230 million (S$314 million) last year. IB is led by a board of gov-ernors, the director-general and the senior leadership team.

Its governors include Mr Win-ston Hodge, principal of Anglo-Chi-nese School (Independent) who has served the Singapore educa-tion service for nearly four decades. ACS (I) became an IB

World School in 2005 and was the first Singapore national school to offer the IB diploma programme in 2006.

There are over 800 schools in 28 countries in the Asia-Pacific offer-ing the IB programme, including 33 IB World Schools in Singapore. United World College South East Asia, in Dover Road, was the first IB World School in Singapore offer-ing the diploma programme.

Dr Siva Kumari, director-general of the International Baccalaureate, says nations are researching the IB strategy and seeing if it can be implemented across the school system, and that Singapore had a huge influence in popularising the programme. Currently, IB is offered by 33 institutions islandwide. ST PHOTO: LEE JIA WEN

Programme designed to deal with a changing world, so its relevance undiminished 50 years on, she says

IB’s Siva Kumari has a mind of her own

Fast facts

InGoodCompany

WHAT EDUCATION SHOULD BE

I think we all have to wise up and say that profession is fundamentally important and in fact needs to shift back to the times when education was about wisdom and building a human being, rather than being (purely about) content. Singapore is an example to the world on how to treat teachers and students.

’’DR SIVA KUMARI, on the importance of teaching teachers and raising skill levels.

Sunday, July 1, 2018 | The Sunday Times Insight | B9