IB Computer Science sits in the sciences group, a placement students find surprising; the course covers more than programming.
Content
System fundamentals, computer organisation, networks, data structures and algorithms, and object oriented programming. HL adds deeper algorithm and abstraction material.
Programming is present and is not the whole course. The exam measures reading code, tracing it and justifying a design more than writing it.
The internal assessment
The student develops a working solution for a real user and documents the process: gathering requirements, design, development and evaluation.
The decisive choice is who the user is. Without a real user and a real need the project stays artificial and the evaluation section collapses, because there is no satisfaction to evaluate.
That user is found at the start of the year. A user invented afterwards shows immediately in the documentation.
The exam side
Questions are scenario based: a system is described and the student proposes and justifies a structure.
Memorised definitions earn nothing; applying a definition to a situation does.
Who should take it
Students considering computer science, software engineering or data science. Also students who want a science group course without a laboratory load.
⚠️ For a student who does not enjoy writing code this course is hard; the conceptual part looks attractive, but the internal assessment requires working software.