← Back to homeICS Al Danah
Abu Dhabi, UAE · Private
Illustration · Abu Dhabi
ICS Al Danah is a British school in the centre of Abu Dhabi and the first branch of the city's International Community Schools network; in the British inspectorate's register it stands under its former name, City Centre, while it calls itself ICS Al Danah. The stages run from FS1 to Year 13 and lead out to IGCSE and A-level. Alongside the British curriculum the school also teaches the UAE Ministry of Education programme: Arabic separately for native and non-native speakers, Islamic studies for Muslim pupils and social subjects on the history and culture of the UAE. The principal is Roger McDuff, with more than thirty years of leading British and international schools in Britain and the UAE, and a former Irtiqaa inspector. The campus is tight for the city centre but densely equipped: separate biology, chemistry and physics laboratories, a computer laboratory and a design technology laboratory, an art room, four libraries, football pitches, basketball courts and running tracks, climate-controlled indoor sports halls, a pool, a canteen, a medical room, indoor and outdoor play areas and a separate kindergarten playground. Its particular pride is a 600-seat theatre-auditorium with a stage, lighting and sound, which the school hires out to outside organisers. There is a support service for special educational needs: the team works with pupils, parents and specialists, draws up individual plans and runs programmes for gifted pupils. What a parent needs to know: the school does not publish its fees in figures - it posts the table as an image - and in the text it names only the non-refundable registration fee of 1,000 dirhams and a re-registration fee of the same size.
Key facts
Programmes
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level
Languages of instruction
English
About the fees The school publishes no fee figures: the table on its fee page is posted as an image. Only the fees and the payment schedules are named in text. A non-refundable registration fee of 1,000 AED is paid after the admissions test and set against the first term's fee; a further 1,000 AED re-registration fee is charged to new and returning students, also non-refundable and also set against fees. There are three ways to pay: in full before 26 August; in two equal instalments due by 26 August and 3 January; or in three instalments - 40 per cent by 26 August, 30 by 31 December and 30 by 31 March. Uniform is paid with the first instalment of tuition and transport. External examination fees are separate. A bounced cheque costs 500 AED, and after two of them the school stops accepting cheques altogether.
Admissions Admission runs through an entrance assessment: the registration fee is paid only after it. The school ties its deadlines to the payment schedule - a place is held by the fee once paid.
Stages and year groups Grades FS1 - Year 13. The stages run from Foundation Stage to Year 13 and lead to IGCSE and A-level. Alongside the British curriculum the school runs the UAE Ministry of Education curriculum: Arabic for native and non-native speakers, Islamic studies for Muslim students, and social studies.
Address Al Danah Area, PO Box 5710
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeBSO · accreditationInternational Community Schools · school is part of the networkschool is in an official registryconfirmed by a school document, by membership or by taking part in a networkclaimed by the school, no confirmation, not counted in the scoreGuide to all organisations → What stands behind each entry
CambridgeCambridge International Education
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 →BSOBritish government inspection of schools overseas
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 →International Community Schoolsschool network
International Community Schools (ICS) is a school group in Abu Dhabi. The site dates its start to 1990, when it opened as Al Ibrahimiyah School with 130 students, and says it now has «over 6000 academic minds«. It lists six campuses: ICS Mushrif, ICS Al Danah, ICS Al Falah City, ICS Khalifa City, ICS Al Manhal, ICS Al Maharat — some American, some British curriculum, covering Pre-KG/FS1 to Grade 12/Year 13. The group also has a separate nurseries site (nurseries.icschool-uae.com). The site names Mohamed Al-Shamma as Managing Director & CEO. The homepage student counter renders as «0+«, i.e. the figure does not load there.
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.
Exams and destinations from the school's official website
The school publishes nothing about where its leavers go: no share going on to university, no exam results, no list of universities.
Facilities from the school's official website
✓Swimming pool
✓Sports hall
✓Laboratories
✓Theatre or assembly hall
✓Library
✓Catering
✓School transport
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Also on site: Sports ground or field · Art studio · Playground
Campus: Science and IT laboratories with interactive boards, separate biology, chemistry and physics laboratories, a computer laboratory, a design technology laboratory, an art room, four libraries and multi-purpose rooms. Football pitches, basketball courts and running tracks, climate-controlled indoor sports halls, a pool, indoor and outdoor play areas and a separate kindergarten playground. A canteen, a medical room and school transport. A 600-seat theatre-auditorium with a professional stage, lighting and sound, which the school hires out for conferences, performances, screenings and ceremonies.
Teaching staff
The school publishes neither the number of its teachers nor their qualifications.
Safety and wellbeing from the school's official website
·CCTVnot stated on the website
·Security staffnot stated on the website
·Access controlnot stated on the website
✓Nurse or medical room
·Counsellornot stated on the website
·Child protection policynot stated on the website
·Staff trainingnot stated on the website
·Anti-bullying policynot stated on the website
There is a clinic on campus. The school names pastoral care as one of its strengths and keeps an additional learning needs (ALN) team: tailored plans, targeted interventions and enrichment for gifted learners, following ADEK's list of categories of need - from dyslexia and attention disorders to autism, speech, visual and hearing impairments.
Reviews
No reviews yet. The community rating counts towards the score once a school has five verified reviews - until then we do not show a zero, so as not to mislead.
Criteria breakdown criterion weight in brackets
Academics and programmes (16%)85 Community rating (16%)no dataparent reviews are needed: the criterion switches on at the fifth verified one Exams and destinations (12%) scored on disclosed data55 Safety and wellbeing (12%) scored on disclosed data60 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)90 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data95 Clubs and activities (8%) scored on disclosed data55 Value for money (6%) scored at the median68 "Scored on disclosed data" stands where we count only what the school has written about itself on its own site: exams and destinations, safety and wellbeing, teaching staff, facilities, clubs and activities. A low score here means the school does not write about this, not that the school does not have it: a school with good security and a sparse site will score low. A school can fill in its profile, and the score will be counted again.
The score is counted from 7 of the 9 criteria.Only those with checkable data count: programmes and accreditations from official registers, the fee from a published price list. Where it says "scored on the median", the school has no data and the middle of the list is put in its place, so that a gap gives no advantage. Admissions, teaching staff and reviews come in as their data arrives.
The full methodology → Similar schools in the country