| The Aga Khan School Dhaka |
|
|---|---|
| Location | |
| Dhaka, Bangladesh | |
| Information | |
| Type | Private Primary School (Play Group to 2nd Grade), Junior School (3rd Grade to 5th Grade), Senior School (6th Grade to 12th Grade) |
| Established | 1988 |
| Head of Education | Nicola Sum |
| Faculty | 115 (2007)[1] |
| Enrollment | 1,142 (2007)[1] |
| Website | [1] |
The Aga Khan School, Dhaka, is an English Medium School, under the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN)[1] and the Aga Khan Education Service, Bangladesh (AKES,B).[2] It is one of the earliest private English Medium schools in Bangladesh. The school has a substantial reputation locally in both academics and sports. The Aga Khan School was founded in 1988[3], in a small campus in Siddeshwari, Dhaka. The school is currently situated in Uttara, Dhaka.[2]
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The Aga Khan School Dhaka was formed back in 1988, in the library of the Ismaili Tariqah and Religious Education Board (ITREB) an institution of the Aga Khan Education Service, Bangladesh. The foundations of the present system were laid by Sir Sultan Mohamed Shah, Aga Khan III, under whose guidance over 200 schools were established during the first half of the 20th century, the first of them in 1905 in Zanzibar, Gwadur in Pakistan and Mundra in India.[3] Since the creation of Aga Khan Education Service companies in the 1970s, the schools have been centrally administered and managed. The school first started with 25 students and 7 teaching staff, occupying classes IX to XII.[2]
In August 1990 the present Senior Section opened in Uttara,[2] with not many more students, but with a number of breath-taking Krishnochura trees to grace the front gates. The flowers on fire were just a part of the many things that made The Aga Khan School a nurturing and caring environment- a refreshing place to study and to enrich the eager artistically, emotionally, intellectually, morally, physically and socially the eager young minds that suddenly started flooding into the school. The Junior and Primary sections were opened in 1999 and 2000, and since then AKS,D has boasted over a thousand intellectuals and over a hundred members of teaching staff.
The changes made in The Aga Khan School, Dhaka over time is rather significant. There is no longer a tin shed used as a ceiling in the classrooms. In addition to the advances made to the main building, there now stand two more buildings within the campus that are referred to as the "New builiding" and the "Red Building" now. Surely accommodations have improved too. There are proper Physics and Chemistry Labs as well as a Multi-purpose room. Moreover, the old backyard is gone too and in addition to the existing football field and basketball court, there is now a volleyball court too.
The Aga Khan School, Dhaka achieved a major milestone in its history in April 2009, it got authorized as an International Baccalaureate World School. In 2009, Mr. George G. Kays ended his long ten years of dedicated service to Aga Khan Education Service as the Head of School.[2] Mrs. Jacqueline Parai served as the Head of the School from 2009 to 2011.[4][2] On 21st of August, Mrs. Jacqueline Parai officially resigned from office due to personal reasons. Miss Nicola Sum, who has experience of working in Australia and England has taken her position as the current Head of Education of the school.
The school has a student body of 1,200 and a faculty of 103 teachers. The school offers education from preschool to higher secondary levels (Playgroup, Nursery, Kindergarten I & II and Grades 1 to 12), following the British national curriculum, leading to GCE Ordinary Level and GCE Advanced Level examinations. The previous Head of School, Mr. George G. Kays, retired after spending 11 years in the school (July 1998 - June 2009). The school recently appointed Ms. Nicola Sum as the Head of the School. There are namely 3 sections, with 3 head's respectively; Fawzia Chowdhury (Head of Senior School), Fatima J. Husein (Head of Middle School) and Farhana Bari (Head of Primary School).[4] The current Chairman of the Board is Mr. Suleiman Ajanee. The school organizes annual events, functions and concerts. The school is most successful in the academic sphere. Every year, the Ordinary and Advanced Level examinees of Aga Khan School perform impressively in the exams, as evidenced by their presence at the Daily Star Awards for schools following the Cambridge national curriculum
The Aga Khan School, Dhaka has been an IB World School since April 2009. It offers the IB Primary Years Programme in English. Additionally, the school is in the process of moving to the complete International Baccalaureate (IB) Curriculum, which will be conducted at new premises at Basundhara, Dhaka. The institute offering the IB programme will be named The Aga Khan Academy.
The proposed Aga Khan Academy has been in the planning stages for several years, and the Aga Khan Education Service, Bangladesh (AKES,B) have obtained pre-authorisation from the International Baccalaureate Organisation (IBO) to implement the IB Primary Years Program (IB-PYP) in pre-school (Play Group and Nursery), Kindergarten and Grades 1 to 5.
His Highness Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, on his recent visit to Bangladesh, laid the foundation stone for the Aga Khan Academy in Basundhara, Dhaka. This will be a full-fledged IBO authorised school offering the Primary Years Program (PYP), the Middle Years Program (MYP) for Grades 6 to 10, and the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme (IB-DP) for students in Grades 11 and 12. However, little construction has been completed and the academy is not expected to be inaugurated in the near future.
The Academy will have International Academic Partnership (IAP) agreements with Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, USA and Schule Schloss Salem in Salem, Germany.
| Tenure | Nationality | Name[2] |
| 1988-1991 | Mohiuddin Babar (acting) | |
| 1991-1994 | Zul Khuja | |
| 1994-1997 | Kenneth McCaffery | |
| 1997-2009 | George Gaddon Kays | |
| 2010 - 2011 | Jacqueline Parai | |
| 2011- | Nicola Sum |
| Primary School | Junior School | Senior School[4] | |
| Head of Education | Nicola Sum | ||
| Head | Latifa Rahman | Fatima J. Husein | Fawzia Chowdhury |
| Assistant Head | Shemoul Hamid | ||
| Coordinator | Marisa Ann Jamaly[nb 1] | Shamima Shahnaz | |
| Operations Manager | Amjad Hossain | ||
| IT Manager | Masud Parvez | ||
| Finance Officer | Karim Nathu | ||