Ras Al Khaimah, UAE · PrivateRAK Academy is a family of three schools in the emirate of Ras Al Khaimah, and the register entry stands on the Khuzam site. Khuzam takes children from pre-kindergarten to grade 12 and holds more than fifteen hundred pupils. What sets the school apart is two routes on one campus: the British national curriculum leading to A-levels, and the International Baccalaureate with the Primary Years Programme and the diploma. The school calls itself the first and only school in the northern emirates rated Outstanding. The Khuzam campus is being rebuilt and admissions to the regenerated site are already open: the school names two libraries, next-generation STEM labs, art and design and creative media suites, a dedicated sixth form centre, indoor and outdoor sports areas and professional-standard swimming pools. A parent should know that the school's own website is incomplete: the fees, enrichment and wellbeing pages return only a heading, and neither the price nor the range of clubs can be checked from them.
Key facts
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
CIS · membershipCambridge · A-Level · authorised programmeIB · PYP, DP · authorised programmeWhat stands behind each entry
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 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 →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: A-Level (ages 16-18). 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 →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), 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. 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.
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