Sherborne Qatar Review

From 2009 - 2011

Academic integrity of school 3

Effectiveness of administration 2

Academic and disciplinary support provided 5

Director's involvement in academics 2

Fair and equitable treatment by board and director 1

School has adequate educational materials on hand 4

Attitude of local community towards foreigners 5

Cost of living in relation to salary (10= most favorable) 6

Satisfaction with housing 4

Community offers a variety of activities 4

Availability and quality of local health car
e 6
Satisfaction with school health insurance policy 4

Family friendly / child friendly school and community 5

Assistance with visas, shipping and air travel 4

Extra curricular load is reasonable 7

Security / personal safety (10 = very safe in and out of school) 4

Sherborne Qatar is a new start-up primary school with an international intake which aspires to be run along English prep school lines. There are now 500+ children in 201011. This is the first stage of developing a school for children from 4-18 years. The school at present is co-ed but there will be twin single-sex senior schools. Sherborne Qatar teaches the National Curriculum of England with a lot of weight given to Arabic and Islamic Studies. Teaching of and about other religions is forbidden. The standard of teaching is generally high but the resources and facilities are poor and very overcrowded. The school caters for a mixture of expatriates and Qatari children and is academically selective. The language of instruction is English, which causes problems in KS1 and EYFS as the children are predominantly Arabic speakers and the idea of immersion in English does not really work. Locally it has a reputation of being one of the few schools which does not auto-matically admit or award top grades to members of the ruling family. It has some serious failings but as a school will probably make it - the hard way.

Governance: Sherborne Qatar is run by a company called GTG with no educational experience. It is a business that has bought the rights to the name and brand of an English public school. It is presented as a partnership; Sherborne School is represented on the board but policy and financial control are in the hands of GTG and its owner, Sheikh Abdullah Al Thani, a member of the Qatari ruling family. Sherborne’s representatives are the headmaster and three people of a business background. The only educational input from the Qatari side is Michelle Wilson whose background is obscure. She currently owns the Iqra Islamic school in Doha and IQRA, the largest educational supplier in the country. Previously, she is believed to have worked at a nursery in North London. The headmaster has no control over the budget and all expenditure has to be cleared through GTG. A great deal of noise is made about the ethos of Sherborne School but as one member of staff put it, "I’ve been to Sherborne and this isn’t it."

The decision to launch the school was not taken until mid-April 2009 with a launch date in September the same year. The headmaster was in Doha by mid-August but no other teaching staff were employed until September; no policies had been written and the staff arrived with three weeks to equip and open a new school with 240 children already on the roll.

Management: The school is managed by an SMT which started as three then became five then seven. The more bloated it became, the less effective. The driving force here is the director of studies who is all efficiency but seems to view education as something to be delivered, rather like parcels. The SMT are well-meaning and decent people, by and large, but most are out of their depth. They have little or no international school experience. There is no real educational vision nor any authority as real decisions are taken by GTG. They get some sympathy as they were left to pick up the pieces as the steering group of trustees walked away with nothing ready. The SMT has been infected by the ethos of spin, trying to sell the school to prospective parents and pupils with some creative tales about the state of the resources.

Facilities: The school is presently housed in a standard government building intended for a single-sex secondary school. The provision of toilets for both staff and children is inadequate. The school has two decent labs, good ICT rooms and a pleasant art room. The library is small and resembles a government archive with metal shelving and a linoleum floor. There are three Astroturf areas and a large sports hall although play space is limited and there is no landscaping or shade outside. The classrooms are very small and inadequate for teaching classes of up to 24. The canteen is small and the children eat lunch in the corridors. A new school is to be built but as yet there is no site. Staff have been consulted about requirements for the school so a brief can be prepared for architects. A swimming pool has been promised.

The school is poorly resourced at present. This is particularly true in ICT where there are many computers but little software and no effective school network. Most classrooms have projectors and interactive whiteboards but no blinds so that the screen is often difficult to see. The maths scheme was not fully in place until 6 months after the school opened and this is fairly typical. The library has a very good range of books but nowhere near enough of them. Even in the world’s richest country, staff do end up subsidizing the education of children, some of whom get more pocket money than their teachers earn.

Staff: The staff come from a variety of backgrounds: English prep schools, including some from Sherborne though one of them left; international schools in the Middle East and further afield; primary schools in the UK and the Commonwealth; teachers of Arabic come chiefly from the Levant. The standard of teaching is generally very high. The headmaster is a former housemaster from England with a deputy with experience in New Zealand and in England. There are several teaching assistants, mostly working in the junior years.

Employment: Two members of the senior management team and three other teachers are not left after the first year. Sherborne Qatar is not an employer to be recommended as it makes extravagant promises but does not keep them. The terms and conditions which are not part of your contract (except when it suits the school) are worthless and will be ignored. The rhetoric is about having the best package and a world leader but much of this is so much puff. Simply, Sherborne does not keep its promises and its terms and conditions are seen as guidance only – anything beyond the laughable Qatar Labour Law contract is seen as an act of generosity. Members of staff leaving last summer, for example, lost 5 weeks pay – that any pay for the holidays is included was seen as benevolent! This is in breach of the very brief terms and conditions that were published only in April 2010. On appointment, founding staff were asked to wait for their contracts, taking them on trust. Attempts to negotiate contracts were rebuffed by the board and at a meeting in The Mirage Suites in September a plea for continuing trust was issued, along with the promise that generous terms and conditions would be issued. Qatari Labour Law contracts were issued but not signed. Eventually these were re-issued with the assurance that they were necessary only to gain residency and the threat that residence would not be granted if they were not. They were said not to be the key document, the terms and conditions would be what counted. After signature the Human Resources Manager stated that the local contract was the only thing that counted. The local contract specifies the minimum standards required; Sherborne Qatar regards itself as generous if it goes beyond this level. Basic items such as medical cover were not arranged for several months, something a competent agent could have done in a day. It is not all bad: a bonus was paid to founding staff who had to resource and set up the school in three weeks; after much discussion a satisfactory resolution was found to settle the problem of pay where promises made in pounds sterling were converted to riyals without reference to exchange rates.

Accommodation has been a major issue. Originally, dental care was promised with a housing allowance of QR 15,000 a month offered to some staff. Both of these were denied later although there is documentary evidence that the budget had included this. The planned accommodation was said to be of a high standard but was not ready on arrival and eventually fell through. The temporary flats were of a good standard, though located on a busy and dangerous road a long way from the school. This was said to be the minimum standard but single staff (including a single mother with a teenage daughter who do not count as a family) are now in tiny flats with no baths, the best that the revised budget will allow. It was left to the staff to find the flats and houses they occupy – GTG and Sherborne did nothing to help after promising the Earth. Dental cover was another benefit used to attract staff but which disappeared and was later specifically excluded. In short the Qatari Labour Law contract is the only one that counts. You might consider taking the matter to court but do have to consider whether you have any real chance of winning a case against the Emir’s cousin.

Health and Safety: A long way below European standards. It can be a real nuisance but exposed live wires, unsecured scaffolding with no more than a couple of planks and many other things will make you long for the bureaucracy and jobsworths with clipboards.

Curriculum: The National Curriculum for England with some modifications. There are no DT facilities, and Arabic and Islamic Studies take up a significant part of the timetable. Science, the humanities and PSHE are all squeezed.

Extra-curricular activities: These are varied and interesting. Staff tend to complain about them but the burden is not really onerous. Too many very young children are at the school all day and then stay on for activities which is tough on them - the school is used as a baby-sitting service by some parents.

Living in Doha: There is not a lot to do in Doha. It is virtually free of street crime but you need the hide of a rhinoceros to be oblivious to the labour gangs being shunted around in yellow buses at the end of a 12 hour shift and the contrast with the immaculately groomed and robed locals. If you don’t get a car, be prepared to shell out a small fortune in taxis as even a ten minute walk to the shops is a nightmare for 8 months of the year. The very real danger is the roads which are lethal - we tend to be sensitive to the threat of crime but the traffic accident toll here is far worse.

Staff and trustee quotations:

"This is the school that I have spent most of my career trying to avoid."

"I asked (a trustee) about staff welfare and he said that staff accommodation would include access to a gym. I said, “But what about mental health?” and he gave me a blank look."

"I’m not very confident with maths and I can’t teach the [standard scheme of work for] ICT."

Resources: "I always tell the truth. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. There are two containers and they will be in Doha on Thursday." (September 2009 – they never came)

On accommodation: "There is no plan B and Your accommodation will be at least of the standard you are in now."

"He’s not the headmaster, he’s the head boy."