This paper is part of a recent comparative and qualitative study of IB practices in the Southeast Asian contexts of Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. In Asian societies, such as Singapore, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, the number of IB schools has experienced a quick rise since the turn of the millennium. As a distinctive curriculum, the IB is gaining recognition and growing within the global education system. Over 7,500 IB programmes are offered worldwide, spanning 5,500 schools within 159 countries (International Baccalaureate Organisation, 2021). The number of IB programmes offered worldwide has grown by 33.3% between 2016 and 2020. Across the Asian Pacific region, there are 1,663 IB World programmes, constituting 22% of the global programmes.

The state governments have also incorporated international curricula into national education systems. This development in IB schools in the three contexts has been uneven, with some countries more advanced in their practices and others still at their infancy stage of development. Despite the varying conditions, IB’s links to the future of global capital, the internationality of education continue to grow in influence. The IB has also been marketed as a form of qualification recognised by universities worldwide, thus establishing a strong global brand.

The study highlights the reimagination of schooling emerging because of the covid pandemic and the tensions from the economic domains across the three contexts. It examines the nature of the neoliberal shift and propose a reassessment of the engagement and enactment of the neoliberal rule post pandemic. We argue that although the conformance to the neoliberal rule has taken on a new shape and direction within the current pandemic state, as shown in the data collected from three varying contexts, establishing positive shifts towards a more collective and connective stance within the countries’ practices did not fully eradicate the tensions that had to be overcome to ensure that schools were more equitable in their practices.

Within the European context, which have faced mass migration, one of the key challenges is catering to a diversified population and allowing for different groups to co-exist harmoniously with a common sense of identity. The adoption of an internationally minded curriculum is aligned with the practices of international schools and providers, which have faced myriad issues catering to diverse school populations (Hayden & Thompson, 2016). More recently, the IB curricula has also take precedence and is in competition with local curricula, offered to both the international cohort as well as the local students. Given its strong positioning within the European context as well as globally, the IB has built a reputation for “elite academically challenging” standards and this branding has appealed within a global front, competing with other international curricula and international examination systems by Cambridge University (Doherty, 2009).

The study involves 15 international schools across three different contexts: Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan. As the study explores the case study schools’ IB curriculum planning, establishment, implementation and adoption, a case-oriented approach allowed for a more interpretive analysis. The focus was thus on answering firstly, the “how” question, examining closely “How is the IB curriculum contextualised in Hongkong, Singapore, and Taiwan?”. The focus was on the following details :

It examined three domains, the planning and establishment, the implementation and adoption as well as the intercultural and international constructs.

The study adopted a qualitative approach to construct the three case studies, Singapore, Hongkong and Taiwan. As the study was conducted within varying national contexts, a collective case study approach has been used, which involves “studying multiple cases simultaneously or sequentially in an attempt to generate a broader appreciation of a particular issue” (Crowe et al., 2011, p. 2). For this particular study, the design type has been adapted from Yin’s (2014) model of a single case design and a multiple case design. With a multiple case design, there are three separate cases, situated within three different contexts –IB schools in Singapore, Hongkong and Taiwan, which were all located within their specific national and educational contexts, the IB educational landscape and within the broader global education policy field (Figure 2). Figure 2 is specifically for analytical purposes, where there is a distinction made between the global context and three national contexts. While accepting that there were specificities for the varying national contexts, all the countries sat within similar global flows, yet these global flows played out in different ways in each local context. It is important to note that this distinction between national and global here is thus made for analytical purposes only. As a comparative study, cross-case analysis was essential to sieve out the similarities and differences in which the schools were adopting and implementing IB. Through the cross-case analysis, emergent meta-level conceptual themes around policy for “IB practices” and “internationalisation” of the curriculum were discussed; enablers and constraints and the relevance of distinctions between IB practices across the varying contexts were also addressed. Qualitative data which stems from semi-structured interviews, transcripts, website analysis were analysed both inductively and deductively, teasing out the key themes from interviews. The analysis of each case study began with a brief overview of the IB policies and practices in the different contexts between the schools (Singapore 3 schools, Hongkong -6 schools and Taiwan -6 schools) and of their IB models, followed by a separate interpretation and juxtaposition of interview data

The empirical illustration from the study within the three varying contexts reflected a clear tension in the neo-liberal market agenda in the practices of the three schools, particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic. While navigating through a competitive globalised market, the schools had shown a more measured approach in navigating their practices, particularly during the pandemic but were still balancing the educative and the market rationale. Data analysis indicated that although leaders and teachers were trying to shift away from a neoliberal mandate to rethink their aims of the curricula approach and the individual’s place within their education systems, this has been a challenge due to the existing frames and pressures of the local education market. Schools were intent on moving towards a more balanced approach towards excellence as schools paid more attention to the educational goals, but this was hindered by the competitive market pressures. There was evidence of schools being more collaborative in their approach to developing curricula and IB created a common platform for shared training, and schools leveraged each for support but this was done informally and through personal networking opportunities. Despite the pandemic appearing to challenge the neoliberal hegemony, ushering in a kinder, more collective, socially just politics within schooling and education across the IB schools, the tensions of the neo-liberal market impact on policies and practices are still at the forefront and very much visible in the three varying contexts.

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