Al Nahda National Schools
Abu Dhabi, UAE · est. 1983 · PrivateAl Nahda National Schools opened in 1983 in Abu Dhabi as a private English-medium school and today run two campuses - a girls' school and a boys' school - but they hold a single licence, from the Abu Dhabi education authority and the UAE ministry of education. The arrangement is this: up to Grade 3 children are taught together on the girls' campus, and from Grade 4 the boys move to their own campus, where the divisions run in three stages - primary from Grade 4 to Grade 6, middle from Grade 7 to Grade 9 and secondary from Grade 10 to Grade 12. There are two programmes and the family chooses. The American one runs from Pre-KG to Grade 12 on the Common Core and the Next Generation Science Standards. The British one runs from FS2 to Year 13 and is built entirely of Cambridge stages: Cambridge Primary, Cambridge Lower Secondary, Cambridge Upper Secondary with the IGCSE examinations, and Pearson Edexcel A Levels at the end. On top of both programmes every pupil follows the UAE ministry programme: Arabic language, Islamic education, UAE social studies and moral education. The boys' campus has been placed in the 'A' band by the Abu Dhabi education authority and judged Good.
Key facts
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · Primary, Lower Secondary, IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeCIS · membershipNEASC · accreditationCollege Board · authorised programmeWhat stands behind each entry
Part of the University of Cambridge. It allows a school to teach the Cambridge programmes and to enter pupils for the exams. There are four stages and they are authorised separately: primary, lower secondary, IGCSE and A Level. If the stages are known they are named in the line below; if that line is missing, the school does not publish them, and the Cambridge registry does not show stages either - it gives only the name of the centre, the country and whether private candidates are accepted. Cambridge calls what it does registration rather than accreditation, and the network holds about ten thousand schools.
What the badge means for this school. The school is allowed to run this programme and to award its certificate. This is a confirmation of the programme, not a judgement on the school as a whole. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it. At this school: Primary (ages 5-11), Lower Secondary (ages 11-14), IGCSE (ages 14-16), A-Level (ages 16-18). Primary is the primary stage, ages 5 to 11: English, mathematics and science to Cambridge syllabuses. At the end of the stage a school may run the optional Checkpoint test, which is marked in Cambridge. Lower Secondary is the middle stage, ages 11 to 14, with the same optional Checkpoint test at the end. IGCSE means exams at around Year 10 or 11, the British counterpart of a lower secondary leaving certificate. A-Level is the senior years, and their results are what British and many other universities admit on.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →It accredits international schools and is a paying association at the same time. It examines governance and ownership, the curriculum, teaching, student wellbeing, staff and premises; a team of volunteers from other CIS accredited schools visits the school. Membership and accreditation are different things here, and schools confuse them more often than anything else.
What the badge means for this school. The school belongs to this organisation but has not been through its accreditation. The difference matters: membership is usually paid for and has no external inspection behind it. The entry is confirmed in the organisation's open directory.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →An American accreditation working since 1885. For international schools it uses an approach where the visitors look first at live lessons rather than at folders of paperwork: the team works in the school for about a week. It is the only one here whose public directory honestly separates accredited schools from candidates.
What the badge means for this school. The school has been through this organisation's accreditation. It was judged as a whole: governance, safeguarding, staff, premises, teaching. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →An American organisation that allows a school to put the letters AP on a pupil's transcript. The permission is granted course by course and tied to a particular teacher, it has to be renewed every year, and College Board reads the course syllabus before granting it.
What the badge means for this school. The school is allowed to run advanced AP courses - not the school as a whole, but one by one: by subject and by teacher. Governance, safeguarding and the primary years are not part of that check. Which subjects are actually approved is visible in the ledger. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it. Authorisation here runs a year at a time: the register lists the school for the 2025-2026 school year.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →A British exam board, the second after Cambridge. It issues its own versions of IGCSE and A-Level: the programme is the same in substance, what differs is who sets and marks the exams.
What this means for this school. The exams are set and marked by Pearson, and the school acts as an exam centre. Universities accept IGCSE and A-Level from Pearson on the same footing as the Cambridge ones. One caveat about checking: the Pearson centre search shows only those centres that agreed to be shown, so the absence of a school from it proves nothing.
Advanced Placement: American advanced courses for the senior years. The exam for a course is set and marked by the College Board, not by the school. A good result is counted by American universities as a first-year course already passed, which saves a student time and money.
What this means for this school. A school does not get to call a course AP automatically: the College Board reads the course syllabus and approves it separately for every subject and every teacher, and the permission has to be renewed each year. Every approved school in the world is listed in the open AP Course Ledger, and this school's entry there stands as a line in the accreditation block above. How many courses a school is approved for, and in which subjects, the ledger does not show in its general listing. AP has no leaving certificate of its own: it sits on top of the school's main programme rather than being a separate system.
The American school programme, with the High School Diploma at the end. It usually comes together with AP courses, which the College Board stands behind, and with an American accreditation - MSA, NEASC or Cognia.
What this means for this school. The diploma is written out by the school itself: the American programme has no common leaving exam, and the content of the senior years is set by the school. Outside checking therefore rests on two things here - the accreditation of the school, and the AP exams if the school runs them.