Who We Are/What We Do:

 

Baltimore International Academy (BIA) is a public charter school unlike any other! This Multilingual Immersion and International Baccalaureate (IB) World School offers children in Baltimore City an education that they would only find in some private schools; and even in private schools, they would not find 5 language immersion programs. That alone makes BIA unique in the United States  and the world! Graduates of BIA go to high school as multilingual, multiliterate students in one of our Target Languages, Spanish, Chinese (Mandarin) Arabic, Russian or French (SCARF). As graduates of the IB Primary and Middle Years Programmes, our students are well prepared for the rigors of high school, college and their chosen careers. Our students are internationally minded, and are prepared to live and work in a Global Environment.

 

We encourage our students to travel to a country that speaks their Target Languages when they reach the 8th grade. We use the money we earn from our fundraisers to defray the costs of travel, so our parents don't have to bear the full burden of the expenses. Our students have traveled to Spain, Costa Rica, China, Russia, Paris, Quebec. It is very powerful for our students to travel abroad and communicate fluently with the natives; these are life changing experiences for our Baltimore City students.

 

Why Do We Seek Donations?

 

We are proud of what we accomplish at BIA, but our school is more expensive to operate than non-immersion and non-IB schools. In the BIA Immersion model, our immersion teachers do not teach English Language Arts (ELA); we hire English Language Arts teachers specifically to teach that subject. We currently have 5 ELA teachers for salaries of $150,000 each. In addition, Maryland Public Charter School Law does not provide Facilities Funding. BIA spends at least $900,000   yearly on facilities, repair and maintenance. In addition, Baltimore City Public Charter Schools have received major cuts in per pupil funding each year. Charter schools must pay for many services out of their shrinking per pupil funding. 

 

But BIA continues to provide a full range of academic and enrichment services for our students. We have not eliminated the Arts; students still have Visual Art and Music instruction every week. We still provide Physical Education and Computer classes for our students every week. We are still maintaining our International Baccalaureate World School status for our Primary and Middle Years students. We provide additional instruction after school in our Extended Learning Opportunities program, which runs from November to April. All of these activities cost the school additional dollars, but we believe that it is important to provide students with a well rounded, wholistic education.