MADINAT ZAYED, AL GHARBIA // Cleaners were removing old carpets from the classrooms and bricks were being laid along the driveway as if the finishing touches were being made to the Jamaiyah School in Madinat Zayed in preparation for the new school year on Sunday. Instead, the primary school has been banned from opening its doors and its pupils have been forced to make a fresh start at other schools. The Jamaiyah School and three other private Arabic schools in the Al Gharbia region were closed down by ministry of education authorities in June because they were not licensed. The decision means 860 pupils in Madinat Zayed, Sila, Ruwais and Mirfa will start the new school year in unfamiliar surroundings. Three of the schools were operated by the Family Development Foundation (FDF) and one was managed by Adnoc. The FDF said its three schools were closed because they were not licensed by the Ministry of Education. "The Abu Dhabi Education Council is the only authority that should be in charge of the education system in the emirate of Abu Dhabi. The foundation is not entitled to act in lieu of any other institution," the FDF said. "In the statutes of the foundation, there is no mention that it can engage in any kind of educational activity. The schools that were closed were not licensed by the Ministry of Education." The FDF's board made the decision to close the schools on May 5 and the school administrations and families of pupils were informed on May 7. Since then, the foundation has been working with the education zones in Al Ain and Al Gharbia to provide alternative places for pupils. "[The education zones] confirmed that they would provide seats for national and non-national students in schools affiliated with the Ministry of Education," the FDF said. Khalfan al Mansoori, the director of the Western Region Education Zone, said the number of children who needed to be placed in schools would be clear only next week, when families had returned from holidays. "Children are only now registering with the schools, and there are also some families who left at the end of the last school year, so we still do not know exactly how many will be joining," he said. "I feel confident we will resolve all of the problems next week. The most important thing is to provide all students in Al Gharbia with access to education." Pupils from the Adnoc school in Ruwais will be integrated into government schools. Mr Mansoori said pupils in the isolated town of Sila were also expected to be integrated into a government school; a solution that might be applied more broadly. Such a proposal would certainly be welcomed by many, including the Issa family from Egypt, whose youngest daughter Rihab, 11, attended the Jamaiyah School. "The students are so sad because we have been together since we were small and everything was great at that school," she said, as her father Baqer Abdul Aziz Issa proudly showed off her impressive school records and academic awards. "No one has explained to us why the school was closed down," said Mr Issa, an accountant. "We would be very happy if Rihab could go to a government school." In Madinat Zayed, the region's most populous town, there are two private Arabic-language schools into which the children can be absorbed, including Al Manar School, where many parents have already enrolled their children. Rihab is one of them, along with many of her former classmates. "I am not looking forward to starting the new school year," she said. "We used to be 10 students in our class, now we are going to be more than 30." As at other schools in the region, teachers started work this week, just as families returned from school holidays to enrol their children in either the Arabic or English streams. Sawsan Sadeq, Al Manar's headmistress, said class sizes were expected to increase to up to 30 students following an influx of between 80 and 100 children from the Jamaiyah School. "There is enough space for them here," she said. "Maybe parents are just concerned because the other school was cheaper." The closure of the schools came as a surprise for Bara Kharnoub, an English teacher at the Al Manar School who has lived in the region for 16 years. "I was very surprised when they closed the schools, but there are two more schools here in Madinat Zayed, so it wasn't too bad," she said. "In Mirfa and Sila, it is more of a problem." Not satisfied with the standard of the private schools in Madinat Zayed, Umm Abdullah said she had been hoping that her five children would be able to attend government schools. Her elder two children previously attended the Jamaiyah School, but moved to another school when they reached Grade 6 because the school did not cater for students above Grade 5. "When they went to the Jamaiyah School it was good and there was support and the quality was good. At least before we had a choice. Now we don't."
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