Volleyball has been part of Scarlett's life since she was nine, but this year brought her biggest breakthrough yet. As a Grade 11 student, she stepped into the libero position for the first time, an undersized hitter suddenly expected to compete at a high level, and led her club team, Leaside, to a U17 girls national championship in Calgary, alongside a Grand Prix all-star nod for her position. On Branksome's senior team, she helped bring home a win at OFSAA in Waterloo. "The journey hasn't been exactly a straight line," she says, "but I've loved every single minute of it, and every moment we don't reach the finish line just inspires us to keep fighting for each other."

You don't have to be a student or an athlete or a member of a club; you can be all three.

Balancing that level of athletic commitment with academics is where IB Select made the difference. "I was a little bit intimidated by balancing the full IB Diploma pathway with sports," Scarlett explains, "so IB Select gave me spares in the morning that I could use to catch up on work I missed or just to study and get ahead." It let her keep every course she wanted, including history, physics and chemistry, while giving her the flexibility to also take on leadership roles in two clubs and stay involved in multiple sports. She credits her teachers for being just as accommodating. "They're very understanding that I have athletic commitments outside of school, and they do everything they can to make sure I'm where I need to be."

Having joined Branksome in Grade 1, Scarlett says the school's greatest gift has been room to be more than one kind of student. "You don't have to be a student or an athlete or a member of a club; you can be all three," she says. Her University Counsellors, whom she's met with since the beginning of Grade 10, have helped keep her options open across both Canadian and U.S. schools. "They've really opened my eyes to programs I wouldn't have thought of on my own," she says. "No matter where you go, you find a loving and welcoming community."