Parents in Dubai choose schools by word-of-mouth

In several wide-ranging interviews with Gulf News on Tuesday, parents overwhelmingly said they rely on positive experiences by friends and family as the most important factor when picking the best school.

The comments are in keeping with a position taken earlier this month by the Knowledge and Human Development Authority (KHDA) which said the majority of parents do not look at inspection results when choosing a child’s school — the findings revealed that despite there being more than 200,000 pupils attending private schools in Dubai, only 26,557 people viewed the results last year.

And many of the viewers weren’t even pupils or parents.

Trust, it seems, is an integral part of the school selection process.

“What is the point of checking the ratings of schools when a school makes changes to please the KHDA staff to get the best rating?” queried Dubai resident Rob Jones. Sharjah resident Raj suggested parents may not depend on inspections because they are aware that schools prepare before the actual inspections take place.

“It was revealed that the schools do a lot of rehearsing to impress KHDA during inspections — and teachers and students were taking the pressure because the school management wants to show to KHDA that they are good.”

Securing quality education for their children is what drives parents.

A Gulf News poll on Tuesday found that the majority (51 per cent) of respondents look for quality education when determining their child’s school. Affordable fees, proximity and extra curricular activities followed respectively.

But how they do they know that the school they pick will measure up?

Mariam Ali, a Lebanese mother of one son, said once again it all comes down to word of mouth.

“My niece speaks fluent English and I saw that she picked up the language quickly. Her mum, my sister, constantly praised the school so when my son was ready to enrol in kindergarten I chose that school.”

Another parent, Hassan Joudeh, a Palestinian, said he enrolled his children in a British private school in Dubai because extended family told him it was a good school. “I asked around and more than one person told me that the school was good. To be honest, I didn’t think to check any official sources.”

Nedal Qazzoh, a Palestinian father of two, said he depends on word of mouth from friends and from reading reviews online on forums as well as checking the ratings on local educational websites.

“I heard about my children’s school from friends. So I then went online and found that it received good ratings and reviews. So far, I am happy with my choice and I think my method of finding the school was successful.”

Online reviews and ratings

Speaking to the founders of a UAE-based educational website, WhichSchoolAdvisor.com — which has received almost two million visits over the last year — Gulf News learnt that many parents go online to search for schools that offer quality education.

James Mullan, co-founder of the website, revealed all but three of the 20 schools which received the most clicks on their site were ranked either Outstanding by the KHDA or in the performing A band by Abu Dhabi Education Council (Adec).

“Whilst it is perfectly understandable that parents want to target the best schools, these are the most difficult schools to get into. Parents would be advised to look at up and coming schools rated Good by the KHDA, or ‘improving’ by Adec, that are on the cusp of a breakthrough. It makes most sense to look at schools established within the last five to six years as often these schools have considerably more availability,” said Mullen.   Gulf News