the very English private school in Shanghai

With rugby teams practising on its playing fields against the backdrop of a red-brick bell tower, Dulwich College is the picture of a quintessentially English private school.

But this is Shanghai, and the near-clone of the college’s 400-year old parent in London is one of a growing number of prestigious British educational institutions lending their names to newly minted offshoots abroad.

Officials at the UK’s Department for International Trade say they are aware of more than 120 foreign projects being considered by British schools. The new branches dovetail with the government’s global education strategy, which aims to support “transnational education” of fee-paying pupils abroad as a source of exports.
Many such pupils go on to apply for UK university places.

David Cook, who ran Dulwich’s first international school in Thailand before becoming headmaster of Repton in Dubai, and then oversaw the creation of schools for both Harrow and Wellington in China, said: “It’s quite extraordinary. Shanghai private school
I could never have imagined 20 years ago that this growth would happen.”

But sector specialists caution that the surge in schools exploring foreign offshoots may not be sustainable, undermining the government’s aim to boost annual education exports from £20bn to £35bn by 2030.

They point out that the expansion comes against a backdrop of political and economic uncertainty in Asia and the Gulf, where demand for the schools is highest, and the schools themselves have limited capacity to expand abroad while maintaining their operations back in the UK.

In the premium private international school market, “the cake is becoming bigger but it is being sliced between many more who are taking a share,” cautioned Ashwin Assomull, a partner in the education practice at LEK, a consultancy. He added that there had been an explosion in both British schools abroad and a number of rival private international school chains.

Colin Bell, the chief executive of the Council of British International Schools, said this growing demand reflected “the reputation of British education, and English as the business language of choice”. He added that UK and US universities were also highly ranked, and British schools were seen as an important route into them.

According to ISC Research, which tracks education trends, there are now 73 British independent schools with sister schools or partnerships abroad. They teach a total of 45,000 students and have annual fee income of $1bn. Another 19 are due to open during the next two years.

Joe Spence, the master of Dulwich College in London, which now has 10 international partnerships, argued that the appetite for elite public schools reflected “the development of the British model over 150 years, balancing academic quality with pastoral care. and supra- and co-curricular activities such as music, drama, charitable work and leadership”.