Top International Schools in India

Education is a crucial part of our lives. To become what we have always dreamt off right from our childhood, it takes years of learning and enhancing our knowledge bases. But as they say, to reach the advanced level of learning, the foundation or the core base needs to be strong and that goes to show how important it is to study in a good school.

Schools are important not only for educational purposes but also for overall personality development though that is only possible when the school provides excellent academic curriculum along with co-curriculum facilities, and overall infrastructure that adds value to the development of a child from a younger age and this is where International Schools come into the picture.

What makes a School an International School?

What makes an International School different from normal school is not the added word ‘international’ but these schools follow an international curriculum which is accepted all over the world or a specific national curriculum that differs from the common curriculum all the other schools in India follow.

The IASL criteria in these international schools play a pivotal role as the students studying in these schools can easily transfer themselves to other international schools not only under national boundaries but anywhere in the world.

With international curriculum and international accreditation, they don’t have any specific common written exam for admissions though. You can witness students from various nationalities studying in such schools along with multi-national teaching population.

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The medium of instruction is usually English though it can be bi-lingual too.

Let us now take a look at the top International Schools in India –

Woodstock School, Mussorie

Woodstock School is an international co-educational residential school founded in 1854, located in Landour in the foothills of Himalayas. It is one of the oldest residential schools in Asia now operating as a non-profit, private institution with Indian Christian Minority status.

Campus

Woodstock School is located in the Northern part of Uttarakhand and covers 250 acres of protected forest in the foothills of Himalayas. It is situated between 6000-7500 feet above sea level and enjoys the spectacular view of Doon Valley, Tehri hills and the ancient Siwalik Range. This view can be witnessed right from the school and through the windows of the residential campus.

Key Points

• Woodstock offers kindergarten through Grade 12 instruction though the residence programme starts from Grade 6.
• Woodstock follows IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Education), and AP (Advanced Placements courses) and U.S. High School Diploma.
• There are six academic departments –
• English
• Language Acquisition
• Mathematics, Sciences, Design, and Computer Science
• Physical Education and Health Sciences
• Individuals and Societies
• Visual and Performing Arts
• It is the first school in Asia to receive accreditation in 1960 and is fully accredited to Middle States Association.
• Woodstock currently is officially accredited as an International Baccalaureate (IB) World School with authorisation for both IB Middle Years Programme (MYP) and Diploma Programme (DP) creating pathways for students of Grade 11 and 12.
• They provide college and career counselling to the students along with personal counselling.
• Apart from academics, the students have other added benefits such as world class library services, outdoor learning sessions, community engagement, Centre for Imagination that ensures the exploration of the students creativity and innovation, Sports, and Global Alliance for Innovative Learning (GAIL).

Dhirubhai Ambani International School, Mumbai

Dhirubhai Ambani International School is located in Mumbai and is a K-12 Co-educational International School and was founded in 2003. The school has been ranked as the Best International School in India for several years and also enjoys the position of one of the top ranked IB Schools globally.

Campus

Dhirubhai Ambani International School is situated at Bandra-Kurla complex making it accessible to students who are living in different parts of the cities.

Infrastructure

• Wifi enabled campus
• Open school design
• Well-equipped, IT enabled classrooms
• Multi-purpose auditorium
• Different disciples laboratories
• Modern centre for performing arts
• Medical centre with experience doctors
• Cafeteria with two dining halls
• Play areas for primary and pre-primary
• Special activity rooms
• Sporting facilities
• Safe campus with modern security systems

Key Points

• The school is affiliated to the CISCE (Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations) and CAIE (Cambridge Assessment International Education), preparing students for the ICSE (Indian Certificate of Secondary Education) and the IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Education) Year 10 examinations.
• The School is a member of the CIPP (Cambridge International Primary Programme) and for Years 11 and 12, the school is authorised by the IB (International Baccalaureate) to offer the IB Diploma Programme.
• Grade 1 to 7 follows an independent and integrated programme that has an interdisciplinary approach.
• Grade 8 to 10 is given the choice to pursue either ICSE or IGCSE curriculum.
• IB Diploma is offered to Grade 11 and 12.
• They have facilities such as career counselling, student care services, and learning and service centres.
• There are ample of opportunities for students to display their talent and knowledge through MUN Conferences, Environmental Initiatives, and other co-curricular activities that includes arts and sports.

Oberoi International School, Mumbai

Oberoi International School in Mumbai is a Co-educational, International Baccalaureate School and was instituted in the year 2008. It is located at Oberoi Garden City and recently in 2017; it came up with its second campus in Jogeshwari-Vikhroli Link Road (JVLR).

The campuses have adopted ‘One School Two Campuses’ Model where both the campuses follow everything same stating from curriculum to policies and are operating under the strategic direction of a Board of Trustees of the Oberoi Foundation.

Facilities

• It has WiFi enabled infrastructure with ultra modern and well-ventilated classrooms along with multiple resource centres supporting learning, and state-of-the-art laboratories.
• Dance-drama studios and multiple music practice rooms along with recording studios that are well-equipped.
• Multi-purpose hall, auditorium, and flexible collaborative spaces.
• Sports facilities that include all sport-related areas, a large Futsal court, and Olympic sized pools.
• The classrooms and campus is tech-friendly with Apple TV and other Apple devices for the students along with interactive projectors.
• The school has been recognized as an Apple distinguished school for adopting latest technology to facilitate learning ensuring a modern learning environment.

Key Points

• Oberoi International School is affiliated to IB (International Baccalaureate). Stating from Primary Years Programme (PYP) for Pre-KG to Grade 5. Middle Years Programme from Grade 6 to 10. And, International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme (IBDP) for Grade 11 and 12.
• The school has an ECA programme that is organised annually and includes soft skills workshop, film making, ace speech drama, art skills, photography, ballet, gymnastics, western and Indian vocal, Yoga, and others.
• The school even conducts Oberoi Film Festival emphasizing on performing arts.
• The school hosts a number of events that includes TEDxYouth@OIS, Dream Fest, Relay for Life, Theatrical Musicals and Plays, etc.
• They even have in-class activities such as Nutty Scientist, moulding and sculpting, Kathak, Robotics, Calligraphy, Chess, etc.
• The school has 47 sports team covering all the major sports and athletics, starting from skating to basketball and even taekwondo.
• OIS houses over 50 school clubs and have partnerships with leading NGOs such as Goonj and Teach for India among others.
• The school also encourages students to take Environmental initiatives, charity work, hosting special events for underprivileged, and supporting different aspects of the society such as animal shelters, elderly homes, refugee camps, and schools for underprivileged masses and specially- abled.

The International School Bangalore

The International School Bangalore and is a private educational institution founded in 2000. It was founded by the chairman Dr. K P Gopalkrishna and is a sister school to the National Public Schools, Bangalore.

Campus

The school is located over 140 acres in the Whitefield area of Bangalore providing safe and secured environment for students for learning and expanding their knowledge bases along with overall development.

Key Points

• The students of the International School Bangalore take IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Education) Examinations for Grade 9 and 10.
• Grade 11 and 12 complete the two-year course in the IB Diploma.
• The co-curricular activities include various aspects starting from Art, Coding, Debating, Entrepreneurship, Robotics, Trinity Speech and Drama to Yoga among many others.
• The school hosts an annual student-run cultural and academic fest ‘Vivum’, which is India’s largest student-led school fest.
• The school has extensive sports facilities including a 25m swimming pool, cricket and hockey pitch, two basketball and tennis courts, a volleyball and throw ball court, two wooden and badminton courts along with a gymnasium and a fitness suite.
• The students are encouraged to participate and are given opportunities to be part of national level conferences such as the MUN Conference and Future Leaders Programme that helps in developing social skills and knowledge of global relations and issues.
• The students are also involved in charity work by organizing fests such as ‘XAVAGE’ which is a business fest and ‘JBPL’ which is a charity football league both completely run by students. The sales revenue collected during these events are preceded for charity.
• The ‘Aajivan’ lectures are held for Grade 9, 10, 11, and 12 where lectures are given by wide range of thought leaders including alumnus and parents that enhances and educates the students.

Indus International School, Hyderabad

Indus International School, Hyderabad is an International Baccalaureate school situated in a plush campus of on a 27-acre campus at Mokila, Shankarpally established by the Indus Trust in 2008.

Facilities

• The campus houses weekly and full-time boarding facilities and the sports grounds.
• Each classroom consists of 30 students and the campus is equipped with play areas for pe-school, interactive projection systems, computer labs and lockers.
• The students have the accessibility to work on their own laptops and each classroom is well-equipped with smartboards with updated modern technology enhancing the learning experience.
• The school has integrated sports complex comprising of a stadium and an outdoor track along with field stadium.
• The schools offer basketball, football, cricket, tennis, athletics, karate, and volleyball among others.
• There is also a horse-riding arena and swimming pool facility.
• There is a separate Cultural Block that holds dance and art studios.
• There is a separate room dedicated to music containing variety of instruments and the school offers lessons in guitar, violin, keyboard, flute, drums and others.
• The open air amphitheatre holds the capacity of 500 seats and is used for outdoor performances, band concerts, plays, and graduation ceremonies.

Key Points

• The School accounts K-12 grades with over 400 students.
• The campus is a day school along with optional boarding facilities that helps students from distanced areas to stay.
• Students take IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Education) Examinations and the school is an IB School.
• The Indus Start-up School offers K-12 education in the world where students Grade 9 to 12 pursue a dual programme.
• The students work in teams in order to develop leadership, life, business and technology-based competencies.

Hebron School, Ooty

Hebron school is an International, Co-educational day and boarding independent Christian school located in Ootacumand, the hill station called as ‘Ooty’ in Tamil Nadu. Protestant Christian Trust operates this boarding school with an aim of providing education to the children of the Christian community in India as well as in other parts of Asia.

Campus

It is situated in 20 acres of the woodland around the former stately home of Lushington Hall. The school shares a common entrance with the ‘Ooty Government Botanical Gardens’. Seen by the Indian standards, the school is very small having around 375 students.  The student body represents 26 countries with Indian students at present comprising of 39 percent and other 61 percent are the students from other nationalities. The 90 percent of the students are boarders.

Facilities

• The school has 15 dormitories and is arranged vertically by age and sex.
• The all boys dorms are on the Lushington campus and the girls dorms are on the Selborne campus.
• School provides sports facilities starting from athletics that includes both track and field.
• Cross-country running and swimming pool is also offered by the school along with all other outdoor sports and indoor sports such as table tennis, indoor hockey, squash, among others.
• Drama festivals are also conducted annually where Grade 7, 9, and 11, and 13 participate in the art of theatre. Inter-school competitions are held within the Nilgiris.
• There are regular voluntary activities that include Bible studies and youth fellowships that help students discover the faith. 
• Music is treated as a priority and is taken seriously where examiners from UK conduct the ABRSM grade exams annually.

Key Points

• Hebron School has Preschool to Grade 13.
• Hebron School students follow the International British School system and study for ICGSEs, AS and A levels. These examinations are assessed by the boards CAIE and Edexcel (International exams).
• The students here are encouraged to take initiative in leadership roles as that only benefits them in personality development but also makes them a role model for other students.
• There are two major student-run events that take place annually in the academic year.
• There are various fund-raising activities too that brings the students together.
• The school even runs an International Guest (IG) system, a program that takes on young people across the global by providing them free lodging in exchange of their services where they are responsible for helping a particular dorm or are given subject-related duties.
• Seniors also join this programme and are referred as ‘Senior Volunteers’ than IGs.

Pathways International School, Gurugram

Pathways International School is located in Gurugram with two other campuses in Noida and Delhi NCR. It is an international K-12 and pre-primary school. A student-centred system is followed with opportunities of working in projects and discovery learning under the guidance of international teaching faculty.

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The school has applied the ‘Theory of Multiple Intelligences’ developed by Howard Gardner of Harvard University.

Campus

The school was launched in 2010 and is a day school. It is situated at Baliawas on Gurugram-Faridabad road on a 10 acre-site with modern architecture and infrastructure friendly environment.

Facilities

• All the three campuses have well-equipped classrooms and laboratories with interactive whiteboards and projection screens that integrates information technology with learning experience.
• Technology is used as a learning tool and every student is required to carry a laptop that is linked with the campus-wide radio-networking.
• There are Science facilities, Library-Media-Center and studios for Art and Craft Design Technology.
• There are specially designed studios for dance, music and theatre along with design technology workshop.
• The school has a library, a media centre, amphitheatre and atriums in each of the building to promote class interactions and seminars.
• They have an excellent sports infrastructure with both outdoor and indoor sport facilities starting from an Olympic size soccer field, all weather swimming pool, cricket pitch and practice nets, golf area, horse riding, billboards, glass squash courts, gymnasium, yoga, aerobics, and gymnastics.

Key Points

• The academic system is divided into three track –
• International Baccalaureate Primary Years Programme (IB PP) for Pre-Nursery to Grade 5.
• IB Middle ears Programme for Grade 6 to 10.
• IB Diploma for Grades 11 and 12.
• The students are part of community services actively and regularly where primary students take care of  issues such as water conversation and keeping the hygiene of the environment
• The middle and secondary level students are allotted tasks such as teaching ancillary staff, working with community schools ad imparting adult education.
• The interact club at pathways take up projects such as eye camps, blood donation, awareness drives on social issues like planting trees.
• They even aid in setting up computer labs in neighbouring village schools.
• There is an Additional Learning System (ALS) at Pathways acts as a full-fledged support system catering to the students who are in need and are suffering from learning disabilities.
• The school is also involved in Green projects and optimization of resources.

Kodaikanal International School, Kodaikanal

Kodaikanal International School is an international, independent and, co-educational residential school located in Kodaikanal and established in 1901. It is a day school and also has boarding facilities.

Campus

The campus is spread on 43 acres in Kodaikanal which is located in Palani hills, northwest of Madurai.

KIS is divided into two academic campuses. The Highclerc Campus accommodates the high school (Grades 9 to 12) and Ganga Campus for the elementary school (Grades – 5) and middle school (Grades 6-8).

It is located in the forest area near the village of Poondi which is two hours away from Kodaikanal. The Highclerc campus overlooks the Kodaikanal lake and the town.

Key Points

• Kodaikanal International School (KIS) is the first school in India to offer International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme (IB) and the IB Middle Years Programme (MYP) in 1975.
• It also awards its own certificate KIS Diploma to all the graduates.
• It is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools (US) and is recognized by the Association of Indian Universities.
• The school has its own KIS Robotics Team and the students of the team compete annually in the International Robotics Junior Competition and also compete in International School Robotics Competition, Seoul, Korea.
•  The school has taken up various social programmes that include community services, social studies focus, and development education courses.
• The school even has The Student Council (StudCo) where the students of high school (Grades 9 to 12) gather and discuss school-related issues and ideas.
• There is also a Middle School Council (MidCo) (Grades 6-8) with the same students and school related issues.
• The school even provides financial aid to the scholarship students.
• The school even has partnership and school exchange programmes.
• The school is also involved in charity works by helping the NGOs in Kodaikanal through documentation and raising funds.

Ecole Mondiale World School, Mumbai

Ecole Mondiale World School is an international and co-educational school with English being the medium of instruction and was established in 2004. They believe in introducing ‘global contexts’ and ‘approaches to learning’. The school is located in Gulmohur Cross Road, Juhu.

Facilities

• The campus provides primary library and media centre, where the students can explore wide range of resources including materials such as picture books, junior fiction and non-fiction, e-books, CDs and DVDs (educational and recreational), teaching resources, iPads, computers, and online research databases.
• The secondary library has a huge collection 80,000 books fiction and non-fiction combined. The libraries has rich resources has magazines, newspapers, audio-video material for support. It has Hindi, French, and Spanish curriculum books too.
• Dance, Drama, Theatre and Music is highly valued and given importance and is a part of the curriculum.
• The school also focuses on IT curriculum and the teachers are digitally literate and trained regularly use cloud-based tools and applications that help the students to increase their problem-solving and high-order thinking ability.
• The classrooms are digitized and with high-speed internet connectivity bringing the technology and learning together.
• A wide range of sports facilities are offered giving the opportunities to students to participate in inter-school competitions.
• The school even has a student council that gets involved in the school affairs aiming at the benefits for the students. They even participate in the community services for social causes through school activities that help in raising funds.

Key Points

• Right from Play School to Diploma, the school encourages its students to work with the IB curriculum with IB Early Years and Primary Years Programme, IB Middle Years Programme, and IB Diploma Programme.
• The school also follows the IGCSE curriculum.
• The school also has a learning support programme for the students.
• They even provide counselling programme to students for university and college related guidance.

Oakridge International School, Hyderabad

Oakridge International School is an international baccalaureate affiliated independent school located in Hyderabad. Oakridge International School provides the IBDP and CBSE syllabus.

Campus

The school was established in 2001 in rented premises in Jubilee Hills. Later in 2002, the school was moved to Khajaguda, Hyderabad. The new campus covers an area of 10.5 acres and has over 3000 students.

Key Points

• The school has stopped the IGSE syllabus and introduced IBDP that includes both PYP (Primary Years Programme for Grade 1 to 6) and MYP (Middle Years Programme for Grade for Grade 7to 10).
• Part of the Nord Anglia Education which consists of over 66 schools in 29 countries and educating over 64,000 students.
• It is the first IB College in South India
• It is the second largest IB College in Asia Pacific
• The school has large pool of trained IB Professors
• The school conducts largest OAKMUN and TedEx events at the school level
• The students come from 21 different countries at present

At present there are 469 international schools in India, drop in the other top international schools you know about in the comments below!

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