Quality of Pakistani and Indian education put under the scanner

Dubai: Nearly half of the Indian students in Dubai study in "good" schools while two of the three Pakistani schools offer an unsatisfactory level of education, the school inspection reports have found.

Of the 23 Indian and Pakistani schools put under the scanner for the first time this year by the Knowledge and Human Development Authority (KHDA), seven were categorised as "good", 11 as "acceptable" and five as "unsatisfactory". None has been graded as "outstanding".

The comprehensive evaluation report of individual schools was to be made available on the KHDA's website from 6am today.

Delhi Private School, Dubai Modern High School, Our Own English High School, Rajagiri International School, The Indian High School, The Millennium School and the Indian High School (Branch School) were the seven schools deemed "good". That means, out of 54,504 Indian students in Dubai, 24,294 are going to good schools.

Of the three Pakistani schools evaluated, Al Farooq Pakistani Islamic School and Pakistan Education Academy were stamped "unacceptable" by the Dubai School Inspection Bureau (DSIB), the inspection arm of KHDA.

Indian and Pakistani schools were exempted from the first cycle of inspections last year because of their distinct academic calendar that started in April, unlike other foreign curriculum schools.

Out of the 189 private and public schools that were inspected last year, only four schools got the "outstanding" rating, 68 were rated "good", 97 "acceptable" and 22 were found to be "unsatisfactory". With three more Indian and two Pakistani schools failing in the quality test, the number of "unsatisfactory" schools in the emirate has swelled to 27.

Announcing the school inspection reports at a press conference held at the Indian High School yesterday, Dr Abdullah Al Karam, Chairman of the Board of Directors and Director General at KHDA, said this year the quality rating may not be the yardstick that decides fee increases. "We are in continuous dialogue with ministry of education as federal regulations decide fee increases. Last year, the framework of linking fee to performance rating was very fruitful. But now with the rents and cost of operations stabilising, we do not see any justified reason for schools to ask for double-digit increases," said Dr Al Karam.

He added that the best thing about the report was the overwhelming response from parents who completed questionnaires.

Responding to the ratings, Richard Forbes, director of marketing and communication at GEMS Education that has its schools falling into both the "good" and "acceptable" category, said: "The uniqueness about GEMS Schools is that regardless of the fees parents pay, their children are guaranteed a quality education. It is clear from past and current inspections that there is a wide range of schools falling into in the ‘good' category — some graded as good will have many outstanding qualities and may just miss out on achieving an ‘outstanding' rating; others graded as ‘good' will have few outstanding features but achieve enough to fall into the that category."

Ashok Kumar, CEO of the Indian High School which is rated ‘good' said: "‘Good, well-led with several outstanding features' is what our report card says. Inspectors pointed out that the only area we are lacking in is communicative Arabic," said Kumar.

Leadership praised

Elaborating on the findings, Jameela Al Muhairi, Chief of DSIB, told Gulf News that Indian schools were remarkable in their leadership and have a well-organised and carefully structured curriculum. In English and mathematics, almost all students made acceptable or better progress and attitude and the behaviour of Indian students is highlighted as a distinctive and notable strength of all schools. However, students' progress in Arabic is unsatisfactory which is attributed to weak teaching skills.

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