DUBAI - After the opening of one of the most up-market, exclusive schools in the UAE, the Gems network is now training its sights on establishing a school that promises to be the ‘Burj Al-Arab’ of education.
At least five more schools are being planned in Dubai within the next two years by the network.
“The Gems Super School is going to be the next generation school. We have been working on the project for almost three years. It is going to be the ‘Burj Al Arab’ of schools,” Sunny Varkey, founder and chairman of Gems, told Khaleej Times in an exclusive interview.
The Dh1.4 billion Gems Super School will surpass even the hi-end Gems World Academy that opened in the emirate this year. Known for its infrastructure and facilities including the first planetarium in a school in the UAE, the Dh250 million school’s tuition fee range between a whooping Dh53,000 and Dh92,000 annually, making it one of the most expensive schools in the country.
The school, according to Varkey, will offer facilities that rival the best in the world. “It will recruit the very best of educational practitioners offering the highest salaries in the world.” he said. “We have got more schools in another two or three levels also coming up, which are going to be much better than the Gems World Academy,” added the entrepreneur in education.
The school is expected to offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) curriculum and may see a couple of more branches in other parts of the Middle East. Declining to disclose further details on the Super School project like the infrastructure and facilities that are on offer, Varkey added the school was currently in the ‘planning and development stage’.
Five schools in Dubai ranging from affordable to high-end, including a mid-section school, are expected to open in the next two years.
Approvals from the education authorities are in process for the schools.
Preeti Kannan