Liceul Maarif International School of Bucharest
Voluntari, Romania · PrivateLiceul Maarif International School of Bucharest (IMSB) is a private day school in Voluntari, north-east of Bucharest, for children aged 3 to 18; it belongs to the international school network of a Turkish foundation operating in 52 countries. The school has two sections. The national section follows the Romanian curriculum in Romanian with intensive English from kindergarten to high school; the high school is a science profile with an English bilingual programme leading to the bacalaureat; it has been authorised by the Romanian Ministry of Education since 2020. The international section teaches in English: kindergarten follows the International Maarif Programme (approved by the Ministry and ARACIP in January 2023, running since 2023-2024), and from grade 1 to graduation the Cambridge curriculum: Cambridge Primary, Lower Secondary with Checkpoint exams, IGCSE in grades 9-10 and AS and A Level in grades 11-12. The international section is listed in the ARACIP special register as a British-system school, and CNRED recognises the Cambridge qualifications. Turkish is taught from kindergarten to grade 10 as a first language (following the Turkish Ministry of Education curriculum, with an IGCSE exam) or as a foreign language up to B2; lower secondary also offers Arabic and French.
Key facts
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · Primary, Lower Secondary, IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeTürkiye Maarif Vakfı · 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: 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 →The state school programme of the country the school stands in: it is set by that country's ministry of education, which also licenses the school and awards the leaving certificate. That certificate is used for entry to local universities, and abroad it is matched to the local one.
What this means for this school. This entry does not count towards the score, and that is deliberate. Every lawful school in a country works to the national programme, so on its own it tells one school apart from no other - unlike the French, German or Russian programmes, which are carried abroad and confirmed by the register of their organisation. We show it because a parent needs to know what programme their child is taught and what certificate the child will get. Counting it would lift the whole ranking at once and still tell nobody apart.
Türkiye Maarif Vakfı is a Turkish foundation created by act no. 6721 of the Turkish parliament on 17 June 2016. It describes itself as "a non-profit public educational foundation" and as "the sole entity authorized to provide educational services abroad": in full, the only body other than the Ministry of National Education entitled to open an educational institution abroad on behalf of the Republic of Türkiye. It runs institutions at every stage, "from pre-school to higher education", and alongside schools it names halls of residence, scholarships and textbooks. The figures across the foundation's own pages differ, and it does not reconcile them: the "Dünyada Maarif" section gives 108 countries of official contact, 542 educational institutions and more than 75,000 pupils; the front page of the same site speaks of representatives in 66 countries; the network's site in North Macedonia gives 55 countries, 517 institutions and more than 70,000 pupils; the Kosovo site gives 64 countries, more than 500 schools, two universities, 14 centres and more than 100,000 pupils. The figure of 108 counts countries of contact rather than countries of presence, and the foundation itself keeps the two apart. The network grew in two ways, which the foundation describes separately: 108 new schools opened from scratch in 23 countries, and 214 schools in 19 countries taken over from earlier operators. The site nowhere separates ownership, management and the local legal entity: it says the foundation opens and runs institutions, but the legal standing of an individual school is not set out. Franchising is not mentioned at all.
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.