Dear Ms. Farrell, Ms Putnam, Dr. Mann and members of the School Board :

We are writing to request that you delay the expansion of the Theory of Knowledge (TOK) class to two years until the performing arts can be incorporated into the International Baccalaureate Diploma program (IB) at Washington-Liberty High school. Prior to this year, children could take a truncated version of the Theory of Knowledge (TOK) class which allowed them to participate in arts education for 4 years in addition to taking the IB diploma Program. The proposed expansion of the TOK class will limit children’s participation in the arts or force them to take summer classes to continue to study their art at W and L. Arts education is one of the pillars of an IB diploma program as per their website, and has numerous benefits to high school aged students not the least of which is bringing joy and a sense of community to the students. There are already negative effects on the arts program at W and L. For instance, many sophomore students have already decided to drop band in favor of doing IB and other incoming freshmen are choosing not to do band since they cannot do it with the IB program. This weakens the arts experience for all of the children.

We greatly appreciate the Arlington Public schools, their teachers and the administration for their commitment to our children. We respectfully ask that you either delay the expansion of the Theory of Knowledge class until the Arts education classes can be offered as part of the IB diploma Program or that you begin to offer each of the arts as an IB class next year if you must expand TOK now.

Sincerely,

The undersigned parents and members of the community