How hard is it to get a 7 in IB physics?

Well, it depends on a  lot of factors. It depends on the student and their style of learning, their strengths, the teacher, the text book, the time spent etc.
But there is a way to get a general idea of the difficulty, thanks to the IB statistical reports. Let us look at the statistics from the November 2009 session:

There were 764 Candidates taking physics SL:
31% of candidates received a 7, 17% received a 6, 14% received 5, 17% received a 4, 17% received a 3 and 5% recieved a 2

There were 751 candidates taking physics HL:
20% of candidates received a 7, 16% recieved a 6, 16% received a 5, 19% recived a 4, 19% recived a 3, and 10% received a 2.

So what can we tell from this data? Well, it is VERY possible to get a 6 or a 7 in both SL and HL, given that this represents over 35% of the candidates.
Now lets take a look at the cut-offs fro the November 2009 session:

At Higher Level:
7 = 71 – 100%
6 = 61 – 70%
5 = 52 – 60%
4 = 42 – 51%

At Standard Level:
7 = 68 – 100%
6 = 58 – 67%
5 = 49 – 57%
4 = 39 – 48%

The cut-offs for a 7 don’t seem very high. Most people however, like to insist that the reason its not very high is because physics is hard. What I say is that the cut-offs are very FAIR and the higher grade boundaries are very attainable. And through the articles that I will be publishing in the future, I hope to get you there, whatever your current physics ability!

Written by Owen Yang