← Back to the rankingInternational School of Amsterdam
Amstelveen, Netherlands · est. 1964 · Private
Illustration · Amstelveen
The International School of Amsterdam (ISA) is a private, non-profit international school for ages 2 to 18 in Amstelveen, founded in 1964 as the first international school in Amsterdam. The school receives no government subsidy. ISA is one of the oldest IB schools in the world: it has offered the Diploma Programme since 1979-1980, was the first in the Netherlands authorised for the MYP in 1992 and the first in the world for the PYP in 1997; it offered the full IB continuum from Pre-School to grade 12 before anyone else. Levels: Nursery (ages 2-3), the Primary Years Programme (Pre-School to grade 5), the Middle Years Programme (grades 6-10), the Diploma Programme (grades 11-12). Teaching is in English; there are Language A and B courses, Dutch, French, Spanish, German, Mandarin and a home language programme. More than 1000 students from over 60 countries attend. The school has been accredited by CIS and NEASC since 1983.
Key facts
Tuition
≈ $25 775–37 004 a year
22 815–32 755 EUR
Programmes
IB · PYP, MYP, DP
Admits from
2 years · Pre-School
Languages of instruction
English
Languages taught
Dutch, French, Spanish, German, Chinese
Registration fee
≈ $378
335 EUR
About the fees Fees for 2026-2027 per year: Nursery and Pre-School 22815 EUR, Pre-Kindergarten 24870 EUR, Kindergarten 25255 EUR, grades 1-5 27710 EUR, grades 6-8 30880 EUR, grades 9-10 31895 EUR, grades 11-12 32755 EUR. Annual extras: capital fee 3245 EUR, administration fee 300 EUR, PTA fee 50 EUR. Payment in full by 1 June 2026 or in three instalments; students enrolling from 4 January 2027 pay 75% of tuition, from 1 March 2027 50%. The school receives no government subsidy.
Admissions The school admits all students seeking a challenging, international, university preparatory English language education who behave respectfully and responsibly; when places are short, priority goes to siblings of current students, international families, applications before the deadline and earlier applications. Nationality and residence are not named as conditions. The admissions committee decides on the basis of previous school records, social-emotional development, behaviour and linguistic background. Applications are online with a non-refundable 335 EUR fee; for the first round of decisions in mid-March an application must be started by 15 January and completed by 1 February; after that admission is rolling, and students can start until the end of April. Placement is by age on 31 August: Nursery from 2, Pre-School from 3 (toilet trained). Students may join without English until grade 9; grade 10 requires intermediate academic English and grade 11 advanced, plus placement assessments; the Diploma Programme admits only into grade 11 and no later than 1 October. Students with mild to moderate learning challenges may be admitted at the committee's discretion, and additional support may be charged.
Stages and year groups Grades Nursery, Pre-School, Pre-K, K, Grade 1-12. Nursery (ages 2-3, Early Years programme, part-time possible), then the IB Primary Years Programme from Pre-School to grade 5 (ages 3-11) with the PYP Exhibition in grade 5 and swimming lessons in grades 1-3 under the Dutch Zwem-ABC programme; the IB Middle Years Programme in grades 6-10 (Language A: English, Dutch, French, German or Spanish; Language B: Dutch, French, Mandarin, Spanish or English as an additional language; history, geography, economics, global issues, visual art, music, drama and film, biology, chemistry, physics, design, PHE; the personal project in grade 10); the IB Diploma Programme in grades 11-12 (English and Dutch A, English, French, Dutch and Spanish B, history, geography, economics, digital society, global politics, ESS, business management, biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and more). Online courses through Global Online Academy and Pamoja.
Address Sportlaan 45, 1185 TB Amstelveen
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
IB · PYP, MYP, DP · authorised programmeCIS · accreditationNEASC · accreditationThe school is listed in the IB register and runs the Primary Years, Middle Years and Diploma programmes. The school is accredited by CIS. The school is accredited by NEASC.
school 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
IBInternational Baccalaureate
A Swiss non-profit, working since 1968. Its programmes are among the most widely recognised school programmes in the world. Authorisation is granted stage by stage, so a school with the final stage does not necessarily run the younger ones; which stages this school holds is set out in the line below.
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: PYP (ages 3-12), MYP (ages 11-16), DP (ages 16-19). PYP is the primary stage, ages 3 to 12. It is not a set of subjects but a frame for the whole school: learning is built around lines of inquiry, and there are no exams at the end. MYP is the middle stage, ages 11 to 16. There are no exams here either; at the end an optional electronic assessment of pupils' work is possible. DP is the final stage, ages 16 to 19: six subjects plus a compulsory core of theory of knowledge, an extended essay and CAS. The diploma is accepted by universities all over the world, and in a number of countries it counts for admission on the same footing as the local leaving certificate.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →CISCouncil of International Schools
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 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 →NEASCNew England Association of Schools and Colleges
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 →Exams and destinations from the school's official website
Average IB score
35 (world average 30.88)
Exam results IB Diploma 2026: 109 graduates, 102 of them full diploma candidates; 99% earned the diploma, average score 35, highest 45 points; 40% scored 36 points or more, 32% earned a bilingual diploma. The average subject grade was 5.44 against a world average of 4.9.
Facilities from the school's official website
·Swimming poolnot stated on the website
✓Sports hall
·Laboratoriesnot stated on the website
·Theatre or assembly hallnot stated on the website
✓Library
✓Catering
✓School transport
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Clubs and activities: Art Class · Ballet · Basketball · Centre Stage Drama · Coding Club · Beatmaking and music production · Dance Mix · Young Engineers · Forest School · Gymnastics & Free Running · Judo · Golf · Model United Nations · Green Team · ISA Swim Team · Language Academy
Teaching staff from the school's official website
·Teachers listed by namenot published
·Teacher qualificationsnot stated
·Number of teachersthe school does not say
·Students per teacher or class sizenot stated
Secondary has seven full-time counsellors (two each for grades 6-8 and 9-10 and three for grades 11-12) and four learning support specialists; primary has its own counsellors. The school recruits teachers worldwide, runs a professional development centre and works with Harvard's Project Zero. The school does not publish staff numbers or class sizes.
Safety and wellbeing from the school's official website
·CCTVnot stated on the website
✓Security staff
✓Access control
✓Nurse or medical room
✓Counsellor
✓Child protection policy
✓Staff training
·Anti-bullying policynot stated on the website
There is a Head of Safeguarding and Wellbeing and designated safeguarding leads. All staff receive annual child protection training; recruitment includes reference checks and a criminal background check that is renewed regularly. Concerns are reported through an internal system within 24 hours, and the school contacts Veilig Thuis when required by Dutch law. Counsellors support students with personal, academic and career matters, and there is a head nurse. The campus has a security team, and visits are arranged with it in advance.
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%)95 Community rating (16%)no dataparent reviews are needed: the criterion switches on at the fifth verified one Exams and destinations (12%) scored on disclosed data80 Safety and wellbeing (12%) scored on disclosed data90 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)95 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data75 Clubs and activities (8%) scored on disclosed data78 "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 8 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