Emiratis studying in Dubai Private sector increase

Dubai: While more than half of Emirati students in Dubai study in private schools, the Knowledge and Human Development Authority’s (KHDA) report revealed that out of the 14,333 teachers only 24 teachers are Emiratis.

KHDA’s ‘Private Schools landscape in Dubai’ report found that the number of Emirati students attending private schools has doubled in the last ten years from 34 per cent to 57 per cent, at an average growth rate of 6.2 per cent.

Emiratis now account for 13.4 per cent of the total student population in Dubai private schools and despite this increase the number of Emirati teachers remains very low.

The report found that out of the 14,333 teachers only 24 of them are Emirati and out of the 24 Emirati teachers only one is male.

The report also found that more Emirati boys than girls are enrolled in private schools which indicates that Emirati parents prefer private schools for their sons and public schools for their daughters.

The KHDA has previously studied the reasons why Emirati parents prefer private schools over public schools and found five main reasons: they believe that they offer a better quality of education, better English language instruction, more convenient location, better school leadership, greater range of extra curricular activities and the extra cost of school tuition fees is affordable.