DUBAI // The bell for class at Al Mawakeb School sounds like an ice-cream truck approaching. It’s a tune that sticks in the memory of pupils.
“Our kids are very nostalgic about it when they graduate,” said Alissar Soubra, the chief academic officer.
On Wednesday night, as the school celebrated its 35th anniversary with parents and former pupils, Mrs Soubra said she would ring the bell as a cue to start the event. “I’m guessing the reactions will be very cute,” said Mrs Soubra, also a former graduate of the school.
The large campus in Al Garhoud is among the emirate’s oldest private schools. It has avoided demolition, unlike many other structures built around the same time, to grow and flourish.
Mrs Soubra likes to joke that the school “undergoes major cosmetic surgery every summer” to maintain its appearance. The lush, shady trees that surround the building and the sing-song birds that flutter around certainly add to its welcoming presence.
But Mrs Soubra says that the bond that has helped to cement Al Mawakeb School community together for so long lies in its family ties and historical roots.
The school’s pre-history dates from 1977 when Mrs Soubra’s father, a former principal, and three other partners opened a school of the same name for 123 students and held classes in a handful of villas not far from where Al Mawakeb School is today.
A turning point came in 1979.
“We were offered this land by Sheikh Rashid [then Ruler of Dubai], may he rest in peace,” said Mrs Soubra. “One of the last things he did was offering the land that we are on right now in Al Garhoud as a gift to Al Mawakeb School.
“He was very keen on education in the UAE, and seeing it evolve and develop. He saw the potential in a school like ours, which was an option to students who were here and people who were at this point coming into Dubai with all the war that was happening.
“He saw that we had the potential to be the home to many families that are looking for this option.”
The K-12 school teaches 2,500 students from various nationalities and offers a mix of American and Ministry of Education curriculums. Pupils study three languages as part of their annual coursework: Arabic, English and French.
Mrs Soubra is proud that many of the school’s graduates are trilingual. She beams with pride as she recalls watching on TV one of the school’s distinguished graduates deliver a speech after Dubai won Expo 2020.
“She gave the speech in French because she’s a Mawakeb graduate and her French is that good,” Mrs Soubra said of the Minister of State, Reem Al Hashemy.
“I love all of my alumni. I don’t like to talk about, ‘I’m proud of this one, I’m proud of that one,’ because I’m proud of all of them,” said Mrs Soubra.
Adonis Nasr, chief executive of Amsi, which manages Al Mawakeb, its sister campus in Al Barsha and the International School of Arts and Science, said: “Our alumni and students have been, and shall always be ... our ambassadors and our benchmark for success.”
rpennington@thenational.ae
