GEMS Wellington Academy - Dubai Hills
Dubai, UAE · est. 2013 · PrivateThe school opened in September 2013 as GEMS Wellington Academy - Al Khail and is now called GEMS Wellington Academy - Dubai Hills; it was built in phases: the first for 680 founding pupils from FS1 to Year 6, the second in September 2014 adding year groups up to Year 11, a Post-16 centre for Years 12-13 in September 2018 and a nursery in September 2022. The curriculum is an enhanced National Curriculum of England, from the nursery to the Sixth Form; in Years 10-11 the school offers GCSEs, in Years 12-13 A-levels and BTECs, with STEAM, a Global Futures programme and Projects for Change on top. After-school clubs are run free of charge by the school's own teachers three days a week: creative ones - art and design, photography, robotics, jewellery making, Arabic, a book club, an Islamic club, music, drama, dance, cookery and ICT; academic ones - maths, power reading, phonics, handwriting and English intervention; sporting ones - football, cricket, basketball, netball, swimming, rugby and rock climbing. Paid activities run separately through the external providers ESM and DELTA: swimming, gymnastics, tennis, karate, chess, robotics with 3D printing and street dance. The inclusion service is substantial - directors of inclusion, SENCOs, specialist teachers, English language staff and counsellors; teaching assistants support classes from FS1 to Year 6.
Key facts
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeCOBIS · membershipBSO · accreditationGEMS · school is part of the networkWhat 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 →An association of British schools abroad with a quality inspection of its own. It has nine membership categories, and the word "accredited" appears in seven of them, although COBIS does its own inspection in one: in the rest it recognises an accreditation granted by somebody 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 →A scheme of the UK Department for Education: a school abroad is inspected against the standards for independent schools in England, including safeguarding and the standards for boarding. The inspections are done by independent inspectorates approved by the department, and the inspectorates themselves are monitored annually by Ofsted. The reports are published in full on the government website.
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 →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.
GEMS Education is a private school group that describes itself on its own site as one of the oldest and largest K-12 (to Grade 12 / Year 13) private education providers in the world. The site dates its start to 1959 («Our story began in 1959«, «65+ Years of Legacy«), while another page on the same site says «over 60 Years of Legacy«. School counts on the site disagree: the homepage says both «52 schools across the UAE, Qatar and Egypt« and «Choose from our list of over 47 schools«, while the Our Company page says GEMS has schools «in the Middle East, North Africa, Asia, Europe and North America«. Students: «200,000 students from over 176 countries« (Our Company) and «over 200,000« (homepage). On ownership the site is explicit: «GEMS Education own, operate and manage schools globally« — it both owns and manages, but does not say which schools fall into which category.
What this means for this school. The network owns or operates the school. Its accreditation and programme authorisation the school obtains separately, in its own name.