meeting with ACS Cobham International School

International school near London — ACS.

I was a pleasant surprise to meet Anastasia as a representative of the ACS at the conference on secondary education in Frankfurt. Many years ago, when we met, Anastasia was representing the famous French school Ecole des Roches. We successfully worked with the Ecole des Roches, while Anastasia, who was responsible for collaboration with the Russian market moved to London. And as is often the case when important part of the team leave the school, to work with it became difficult. And now, a few years later, I felt happy that Anastasia was representing promising for our cooperation school near London. We had a very alive and rich conversation, which I literally just published.

L: Anastasia, the school is very interesting, but I've never visited it, tell me how to sell ACS Cobham?

A: How to sell? It's easy. Let's start with the fact that the school is well located. A half hour train ride from Waterloo, 20 minutes from Heathrow and 40 minutes from Gatwick. 128 acres of beautiful green territory. All profits are returns back into the development of the school. If you come to school, you would have the feeling that it l  was just opened: everything is new, clean, solid, shiny – just beautiful. A month ago we have a Commission from the Good Gide School and they told us that “you have Facilities to die for”. I think it says a a lot.

We have a very small boarding house, only for 90 students and the ratio of teachers to students only one to seven. Not many schools can boast such a ratio. We have teachers living with children in the boarding house: teacher of physics, chemistry, and other subjects, and there are no problems with the homework. The living conditions are excellent, boys and girls are in separate wings, security everywhere. We are on the grounds of Chelsea and it is a very rich and safe area, but still there is school security.

L: I noticed that you have an unusual for Britain set of programs: IB and American High School Diploma. Why?

A: Our school was established 47 years ago as an international school, as a lot of foreign families came to work to London and they required international education for their children. We have more than 1500 day students, mostly Americans, Canadians, Scandinavians, Germans, whose parents work in London, but then they want their kids to return and received higher education at home. That's why our school offers such programs, because they allow you to enroll to universities in any country.

I know that outside of Europe, our school is not very well known, few people know that we were among the first schools in Britain who began to teach IB. We have over 30 years of teaching experience and most importantly they are members of  IB comity across the UK, make IB curriculum, train teachers from other schools. Every year  we have children who receive very good results, average score at school 35, while many students received 40 points. We have 90 children in boarding school but fifteen hundred with day students and these are very good results for schools of this size. In high school there are 160 students on IB program of which every year 80 graduates, so it is a very good result.

Every year, our graduates enter Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial College, London School of Economics, Ivy League Universities. And this is not single cases. Our children are in Harvard, Yale and Princeton and it's not like in other schools, someone got there in past years and they publish it every year. Every year there are graduates who enter these universities.

I was recently in Russia and consulted a family They said they were not interested in any University specifically, they were just interested that the child studied nano-technology and bio-medicine. They asked me to tell where graduates went to study nano-technology after the school. I just started working here, so I called the school. It would seem that such a narrow area, but it turned out, last year 7 people went to study nano-technology: Imperial, Bristol, Durham, Bass – all in the Russell Group. But, again, because the school is big, we can accept children with different academic abilities. If someone is very talented, wants to get to top University, we have advanced program, the coordinator will work with each student to set him tasks to achieve the highest results. But if the child has a decreased ability or problems with English, we have support in all subjects. Such children would get individual tutoring.

L: But it is probably at extra costs?

A: No. Our school is quite expensive  43,000 pounds per year. BUT all inclusive. Every Saturday all students go on trips, it could be London, could be Northern England may be a Disney Land in Paris. And all of this is included. Nothing is optional, no extras. Of course, on vacation students need to leave for home stay with guardians, but it is not included in the learning process.

Second, we have an American High School Diploma. We are so successful because we have such a range of programs. Nowhere in the world there is such a collection of nationalities as in London and all these children need education that they could either apply to the best universities in the world, or return back home and study there.

But I really like school, I know that we offer wonderful living conditions, high results, best set of universities, where our graduates went to study that any family would be lucky for their child to study here.

In conclusion, we arranged my visit to the school after next conference in London in November. Read my report on school visit.