Dubai, UAE · est. 1995 · PrivateThe Westminster School - Dubai has stood in Al Qusais since 1995 and calls itself the largest English curriculum school in the UAE: more than five thousand pupils from over seventy countries, from the Foundation Stage to Year 13, that is from three to eighteen years old. The curriculum is the National Curriculum for England, the language of instruction is English, and the aims and values of GEMS and a UAE national component are added to it; the school has a separate team for Arabic and Islamic studies. The path through the stages is set out plainly: Foundation Stage 1 and 2 on the EYFS framework, the National Curriculum for England from Year 1 to Year 8, Year 9 spent preparing for the IGCSE and choosing subjects, Year 10 and Year 11 spent sitting the IGCSEs, and Year 12 and Year 13 taking AS and A level. The senior stage gives a two-year GCE A level course and, alongside it, the vocational Pearson International BTEC Level 3 qualification in business and information technology, and getting there is not easy: entry to Year 12 is competitive and places go only to those with the required IGCSE grades. This is a big school and the campus matches it: 180 classrooms, six laboratories for chemistry, biology and physics, five computer rooms, three libraries, rooms for music, art and craft, a canteen and a large artificial-surface field; school transport is handed to the operator School Transport Services, with a fleet of 64 air-conditioned buses. The school has held Microsoft Showcase School status since 2015 and a Common Sense Digital Citizenship certificate, and its digital side is set apart. The main thing that distinguishes it from the other British schools of Dubai is the price: tuition starts at 9,362 dirhams a year in the pre-school group and even in the leaving year does not reach 19 thousand, three to five times below its neighbours in the emirate on the same curriculum.
Key facts
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE, A-Level · authorised programmeBSO · accreditationBSME · part of the associationGEMS · 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: 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 →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 →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 →A British vocational qualification from Pearson: not an academic course with an exam at the end, but a programme of practical assignments in a particular trade, from engineering and business to art and sport.
What this means for this school. Teaching and assessment work differently from A-level: instead of written exams there is a run of practical assignments marked by the school, while Pearson checks the school itself and samples the work. British universities do accept BTEC, but not all of them and not for every course: level 3 carries the same UCAS points as A-level, and that is what a family aiming at a particular university should look at. For a child who needs the classic academic route, BTEC is not a replacement for A-level but a different path.
GEMS Education is a private school group that describes itself on its own site as one of the oldest and largest K-12 (to Grade 12 / Year 13) private education providers in the world. The site dates its start to 1959 («Our story began in 1959«, «65+ Years of Legacy«), while another page on the same site says «over 60 Years of Legacy«. School counts on the site disagree: the homepage says both «52 schools across the UAE, Qatar and Egypt« and «Choose from our list of over 47 schools«, while the Our Company page says GEMS has schools «in the Middle East, North Africa, Asia, Europe and North America«. Students: «200,000 students from over 176 countries« (Our Company) and «over 200,000« (homepage). On ownership the site is explicit: «GEMS Education own, operate and manage schools globally« — it both owns and manages, but does not say which schools fall into which category.
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.