← Back to homeThe City School International
Dubai, UAE · Private
Illustration · Dubai
The City School International is the Dubai school of The City School group, which dates itself to 1978 and operates in five countries: the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Pakistan. The Dubai campus stands in Nadd Al Hamar and occupies a single building divided by stage: the Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 with their own entrance and exit, the primary and secondary school on the same floor, and the senior school above, each area with classrooms equipped for its age group. The curriculum is British, with the EYFS in the early years, and the school describes a pupil's path plainly as the road from early years education to the Cambridge international examinations. The senior stage is split into streams: in the fee table Years 12 and 13 appear in two versions, B and SC. Among its facilities the school names a science laboratory and an ICT lab on the first floor, and it describes its computing provision at length - modern machines with powerful processors and fast storage, software and collaboration tools. The school does not run its extracurricular programme itself: it contracts with outside clubs and sports organisations whose coaches come to the campus. There are four clubs - karate, football, basketball and roller skating - and the school promises to take a pupil from beginner to advanced level. Beyond them it has a student council, a careers counselling service, a gifted and talented programme and a wellbeing and child protection page.
Key facts
Tuition
≈ $4 025–9 719 a year
14 781–35 694 AED
Programmes
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level
About the fees The annual fee in the 2025-2026 table is split into tuition and other charges, with the full package alongside. Tuition: FS1 is 14,781 dirhams, FS2 is 15,087, Year 1 and Year 2 are 16,460 each, Year 3 and Year 4 are also 16,460, Year 5 to Year 9 are 17,833 each, Year 10 is 22,220, Year 11 is 26,746, Year 12 in stream B is 33,530, and Year 12 in stream SC and Year 13 in both streams are 35,694. The other charges come on top and run from 1,920 to 3,290 dirhams by stage, so the full package works out at between 16,701 dirhams in FS1 and 38,984 in the senior years. It is paid by three cheques, on 1 August, 1 December and 1 March, with the first about twice the size of the other two. Transport is set out by the school on a separate page.
Admissions The year group is set by age on 31 August of the school year against the KHDA approved cut-off dates: FS1, that is Pre-K, takes three-year-olds, FS2 four-year-olds, Year 1 five-year-olds and so on a year per class. The school notes separately that the age requirements for new pupils in FS1 to Year 2 changed from 2021-2022 under UAE Ministry of Education Resolution no. 24. Age-appropriate assessments follow: the school checks whether the child is ready for a challenging curriculum and able to integrate with the existing cohort. There is an entrance test and two separate application forms, one for Foundation Stage to Year 11 and another for the Sixth Form.
Stages and year groups Grades FS1 from age 3 - Year 13. The stages run straight through: the Foundation Stage on the EYFS, the primary school, the secondary school and the Sixth Form. The building is divided into zones by stage: the Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 with their own entrance and exit, the primary and secondary school on the same floor, and the senior school above. The senior stage runs two streams, marked B and SC in the fee table.
Address Plot 416-1297, Nadd Al Hamar, P.O. Box 5760
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeBSME · part of the associationThe Cambridge registration is taken from the registry and is borne out by the school's own page about itself: it describes a pupil's path as running from early years education all the way to the Cambridge international examinations, and it keeps a separate Boards and Assessments page. BSME membership is not entered in the card: that organisation is not yet in our directory. The City School group that owns the school runs in five countries - the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Pakistan - and is not in the directory either.
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
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 →BSMEAssociation of British schools in the Middle East
One hundred and eighty schools in ten countries - Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE; more than half of the membership is in the UAE. It runs no inspections of its own at all. Instead it requires somebody else's accreditation, and the requirement is strict: a school not already accredited on joining must gain accreditation within two years and then maintain it. The inspectorates are EDT or ISI, which means the accreditation in question is the British government's BSO scheme. The organisation has withdrawn its former lighter routes in - one route remains.
What the badge means for this school. The school belongs to the association, and the association requires its members to hold a real accreditation: for Gulf schools that is almost always BSO. What to look at is that accreditation rather than this badge. Nor is the badge empty - there is no inspection of its own behind it, but a school is not admitted to the association without somebody else's accreditation. The entry is confirmed in the organisation's open directory.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →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 poolnot stated on the website
·Sports hallnot stated on the website
✓Laboratories
·Theatre or assembly hallnot stated on the website
·Librarynot stated on the website
·Cateringnot stated on the website
✓School transport
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Campus:
Clubs and activities (4): Karate · Football · Basketball · Roller skating
Teaching staff
The school publishes neither the number of its teachers nor their qualifications.
Safety and wellbeing from the school's official website
The school says nothing on its website about security, medical care or pupil support.
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 data55 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)85 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data70 Clubs and activities (8%) scored on disclosed data70 "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