The British School Al Khubairat
Abu Dhabi, UAE · est. 1968 · PrivateThe British School Al Khubairat was founded in 1968 and works in Abu Dhabi as the British Embassy school - that is what it calls itself. The land was granted to the school by the first president of the UAE, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, and its standing is fixed by Amiri Decree No. 5 of 1971; the school remains under the embassy's patronage. By its constitution it is a not-for-profit and academically non-selective community school for all the children of the district, co-educational and without boarding. Teaching follows the British curriculum from the Foundation Stage to Year 13, with A Level and BTEC qualifications as the exit. The school belongs to three British associations: IAPS, HMC and BSME. The main thing a parent should know: books and materials are included in the fee, but the school states plainly that entry for external examinations is the parents' responsibility.
Key facts
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeIAPS · part of the associationHMC · part of the allianceBSME · part of the associationWhat 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: IGCSE (ages 14-16), A-Level (ages 16-18). 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 →The association has no quality inspection of its own, and somebody else's is not required: a live BSO inspection is called desirable, and which other inspectorates the committee accepts is not published. The only visit is a one-day consultancy, and the website itself notes that this is not a compliance judgement. As at HMC, the member is the head.
What the badge means for this school. The school belongs to this network. That is not a quality inspection: a network is something a school joins, while an accreditation is something a school goes through. There is no entry in the organisation's open directory: the status comes from the school's own words.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →It is a head who becomes a member of this conference, not a school: membership is offered to the head, and in some categories the logo is marked as personal. A badge on a school's website means its head belongs to the conference. For full international membership there is a check - two people, two days - but no live external inspection is required.
What the badge means for this school. The school belongs to this network. That is not a quality inspection: a network is something a school joins, while an accreditation is something a school goes through. There is no entry in the organisation's open directory: the status comes from the school's own words.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →One hundred and eighty schools in ten countries - Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE; more than half of the membership is in the UAE. It runs no inspections of its own at all. Instead it requires somebody else's accreditation, and the requirement is strict: a school not already accredited on joining must gain accreditation within two years and then maintain it. The inspectorates are EDT or ISI, which means the accreditation in question is the British government's BSO scheme. The organisation has withdrawn its former lighter routes in - one route remains.
What the badge means for this school. The school belongs to the association, and the association requires its members to hold a real accreditation: for Gulf schools that is almost always BSO. What to look at is that accreditation rather than this badge. Nor is the badge empty - there is no inspection of its own behind it, but a school is not admitted to the association without somebody else's accreditation. The entry is confirmed in the organisation's open directory.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →A British vocational qualification from Pearson: not an academic course with an exam at the end, but a programme of practical assignments in a particular trade, from engineering and business to art and sport.
What this means for this school. Teaching and assessment work differently from A-level: instead of written exams there is a run of practical assignments marked by the school, while Pearson checks the school itself and samples the work. British universities do accept BTEC, but not all of them and not for every course: level 3 carries the same UCAS points as A-level, and that is what a family aiming at a particular university should look at. For a child who needs the classic academic route, BTEC is not a replacement for A-level but a different path.