Middle East schools can benefit from UK education reforms

Published: Tuesday 8 Oct 2019

AQA’s Professor Toby Salt gave the opening address at a breakfast briefing in Dubai explaining the strengths of the UK’s reformed qualifications and their benefits to international schools.

The event was hosted by OxfordAQA, the joint venture between AQA and Oxford University Press, that provides qualifications to schools teaching a British curriculum around the world.

The theme of the briefing was Exporting Excellence: Creating British Schools internationally. Professor Salt addressed the delegates – including CEOs and Principals of school groups in the United Arab Emirates – and explained how the UK’s reformed qualifications are helping students develop more advanced, higher-order skills and better equipping them to progress and meet the demands of university study.

Delegates at the briefing discussed the new UK qualifications and the need for educators to export the excellence of the reformed curriculum internationally.

Speaking about the discussion, Professor Salt said:

“Reformed qualifications in the UK mean students are emerging with more rigorous qualifications, and are better equipped and more experienced in taking high-stakes exams, so schools in the Middle East need to make sure they’re not missing out.

“Parents all over the world want their children to experience a British-style education, in schools offering the British curriculum and British qualifications – but we need to keep reminding them why this is the best choice they could make.

“OxfordAQA’s international exams give students of all abilities the best opportunity to perform well and achieve their potential: they are tailored to students in British curriculum schools in the Middle East, and have the benefit of 100 years of AQA's assessment expertise behind them."

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