Hi Nikath,

You son needs to be four years of age by 31st July to commence school.  Since your son will not have reached this point until January 2022, the earliest that he will be able to start school is April 2022.  You will need to contact the schools of interest to you directly in the winter term (September/October is the usual time) to apply for entry.   The academic year for the Indian curriculum runs from April to March.

Hi Mansoor,

You do not mention in which Emirate you are planning to educate your son.  If Dubai, this would not be such a problem as it is left to the school to determine whether a student is capable of transferring for the final years of school.  There are two issues with your plan.

Firstly, if your son joins a UK curriculum school in September, he will not be able to join Grade 10/Year 11, as this is part way through the two year I/GCSE programme.  He would need to repeat Grade 9/Year 10 in order to be able to start these external exams – which are equivalent to the Grade X CBSE qualification.

Secondly, all  Emirates, others than Dubai, do not permit curriculum change after Grade 8 in order to avoid this exact problem. Students are expected to do all four years of high school education in the same curriculum.

Our advice would be transfer your son to Semester 2 at a CBSE curriculum school in Grade 10. If you are in Dubai, and still wish to consider British curriculum, this would potentially be possible once he has completed Grade 10 and the first term of Grade 11 – he would then join in September 2021 in Grade 11/Year 12.  Your son would effectively lose one year if you go this route.

Your daughters will be able to move to a US curriculum school and will join Grade 8 and Grade 4 respectively as the US curriculum is graded from KG1 (FS2 equivalent) to Grade 12 (Year 13 equivalent).

You will need to apply for a transfer certificate from your current school which will be forwarded electronically to the new US curriculum school once you have gained admission.

Schools in Dubai are only planning on-line learning for the first term as there is no decision as to whether online learning will continue for term 2 onwards.

The online organisation that offers full-time on line learning is i-Cademy.  You can check the review on WhichSchoolAdvisor.com.  This is US curriculum.

HI Syed,

Having checked the ‘school’ website and also the TAMM Abu Dhabi website which is the Abu Dhabi Government website, I am sorry to inform you that this school does not exist.  The creators of the site have taken photos from at least one existing UAE school.  In addition, the telephone number is a mobile number – always a sign that all may not be as it seems.

The aim of this type of scam website is to attract teachers who then pay for their visa in advance – of course without any visa being issued for a genuine school or job.  Please do check the TAMM website, distrust any offer for a job to which you have not made an application and where the salary is too good to be true!

Hi Sam,

I am afraid that there is no flexibility in relation to enrolment dates for children in UAE schools – these are determined by the Ministry of Education and applied by the regulator in each emirate.  As your daughter will not have turned 4 by 31st July this year, she will not be accepted.  You may wish to consider her joining a pre-KG class for which she is age-appropriate, although the number of schools offering this grade is limited.

The other option would be to consider a UK curriculum school where she would be accepted in September in FS2 (the equivalent of KG1) since the cut off date is generally 31st December.   However, if you wished to transfer her to an Indian curriculum school later, she would almost certainly have to repeat a grade as she would not have completed the academic year in the UK curriculum when joining an Indian curriculum school at the start of the April academic year.

Hi Vinetta,

I am not sure whether your son’s birthday is in September or December, but either way, since he will 5 years old by the end of the year.  I do not believe it will be possible for him to transfer to a UK curriculum school in the UAE before September when the new academic year begins.  Some UK curriculum schools use 31st December as the cut off date, so for a child turning five by the end of the year, they may propose Year 1, but given that he is currently in pre-KG, the equivalent of FS1  – so a full year of education would have been missed – I think it is very unlikely that this would be recommended.

Schools that use the 31st August cut off date would not consider him for Year 1, although they would offer FS2 (the equivalent of KG1) in September.  We would always advise  not to place a child in a grade or year group that is not appropriate for him from an academic or social standpoint.  There is a lot of evidence that children who are the oldest in their class do much better academically and in all other aspects in the long run.

Dear Selhage,

Have you contacted the British Council?  I assume from the tags that you are based in Dubai.  The British Council arranges for  students to apply for and sit UK-based examinations including IGCSE – this is the link: https://www.britishcouncil.ae/en/exam/igcse-school.

Good Luck!

Dear Shab,

Your daughter’s age is not relevant at this stage, as it is her school grade/year group that counts and whether she has completed the grade/year group.  I assume she is currently in Year 8 (which is the equivalent of Grade 7) but will not complete it until the end of the current academic year (June).  The academic year has already started in the Indian curriculum and I do not believe it would be possible for your daughter to join in September, as she will have missed one term already by that stage.  Normally, the process would be for her to join the school in April at the start of the academic year.

I would advise you to contact the school(s) that you are considering and confirm whether it would be possible for your daughter to transfer before the summer break (in June).  Please bear in mind though that she will almost certainly have to repeat Grade 7, since she will not have completed the equivalent year in her current school.

Dear Naveen,

I am sorry to read of the difficulty you are facing with the admission of your son.   We would advise you to consider two steps; firstly, if you applied only to the school that has refused your son, you may still apply to other schools in Ajman and in neighbouring emirates.   The following is a link to schools in Ajman, RAK and UAQ  – https://whichschooladvisor.com/uae/school-search?city%5B%5D=2&city%5B%5D=6&city%5B%5D=8.    Depending on your budget, some of these may be an option.  GEMS schools generally are very capable of supporting children with additional needs, whereas we would not suggest Choueifat.  St. Mary’s is opening a new school in RAK in September 2019.  Unfortunately, the lack of published inspection reports for schools in the Northern Emirates makes it difficult to identify schools that are supportive of children who made need extra support.

I would suggest that you contact the schools that may seem to suit your needs in terms of curriculum and budget.  It would be advisable to inform them that your son may  be hyperactive or have some additional needs based on a assessment at one school.

If this fails, I would advise you to contact Ajman Education Zone – 971 800 51115.  They are located next to the Teacher Training College on Sheikh Zayed Street, Ajman.

Hi Mubasherx,

We certainly do have Amity International School on the site and, in fact, the review was recently updated.  Here is the link: https://whichschooladvisor.com/uae/school-review/amity-international.