Jubilee School

Infobox University
name = The Jubilee School


city = Amman
country = Jordan
established = 1993
campus = Suburban
type = Private | head_label = Director
head= Abla Zureikat
mascot = None
website = [http://www.jubilee.edu.jo jubilee.edu.jo]

The Jubilee School is a Private, independent, residential, co-educational secondary school located in Amman, Jordan. It provides a four-year comprehensive balanced program for outstanding students with high intellectual ability, and with a strong commitment to scholarship.

The project to establish the School was first announced in 1977, during Jordan's Silver Jubilee celebrations of King Hussein's accession to the throne, as a tribute to His Majesty's development efforts, especially in the field of education. In 1984, Queen Noor accepted responsibility for the as yet unrealized project, and a year later it became one of the major undertakings of the newly established Noor Al Hussein Foundation. After years of research, planning and teacher training, and temporarily housed in a Ministry of Education building, the School opened its doors in 1993 to eighty-nine of Jordan's brightest ninth graders admitted for their exceptional intelligence and academic achievement, and in 1997 the School celebrated its first graduating class. In 1995, H. M. King Hussein laid the cornerstone for the first phase of the construction of the School's permanent home in Yajouz outside Amman, and in early 1998 the School moved from its temporary site to its permanent home. In 2000, the ownership of the "Jubilee School for Gifted & Talented Students" was transferred from the Noor Al Hussein Foundation to the newly established King Hussein Foundation as its first project in the area of education and leadership.

Philosophy

*Successful learning takes place through exploration and experimentation, rather than through a rigid transmission of facts from teacher to student. Students should learn to become effective users of knowledge, not merely passive recipients.

*An academic curriculum should stimulate students' higher-level thinking skills and enhance their creative problem solving and decision-making abilities.

*Students should be given opportunities for innovative learning outside the classroom through community service programs, seminars, guest lectures, mentorship and exchange programs, research projects, independent studies and field trips.

*In order to contribute effectively to society, students need to develop self-confidence, tempered by humility and a sense of responsibility towards their larger community.

*Students preparing for leadership positions need to develop exceptional oral and written communication skills.

*Students must develop independent initiative and learn from their successes as well as from their failures.

*In addition to serving its students, one of the School's primary functions is to provide a variety of educational services to public and private institutions through workshops and training programs for teaching and administrative staff.

Goals

*To provide an integrated balanced educational program to its students who are accepted on the basis of competence, capability and exceptional performance, based upon solid academic grounds and extensive opportunities for students to develop higher-level thinking skills, creative problem-solving, leadership and effective decision-making.

*To achieve educational excellence by means of developing training and educational programs and materials to be later disseminated and utilized by the educational community in Jordan and the region. Thus, to serve as a laboratory for the development, testing and dissemination of innovative techniques in mathematics, science, and humanities which can become a resource for secondary school teachers in Jordan.

*To develop public awareness of the characteristics and needs of talented children through outreach programs, the dissemination of research findings, counseling and community service.

Graduation and beyond

Jubilee graduates consistently rank in the top 10 percent of national exam scores for secondary schools. Virtually all of graduates attend highly competitive colleges and universities in Jordan, the Middle East, Europe and the United States. Recent graduates have attended, Yale University, Harvard University, University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, University of Chicago, Brown University, the University of Michigan, and Washington University.

Quotations

*“When I am in deep stress, I resort to the Jubilee School where I enjoy the democratic educational environment which is based on freedom of speech, and responsible mature dialogue.” - King Hussein of Jordan

*"We do not want simply to produce educated young people, important as that is; we hope to nurture educated activists and future leaders who can identify and help to resolve the challenges within their own societies and contribute to stability, peace and justice in the wider world, " – Queen Noor, describing the mission of the Jubilee School

Arrest of Al-Asha

On July 2, 2007, the British Government arrested a Jubilee School alumnus Mohammed Asha for planning terrorist attacks in the Scottish Glasko airport. The school showed no response, however Asha's parents strictly denied the fact of their son being a terrorist.

Asha graduated from the Jubilee School in 1998 with an average of 98.3% in his Tawjihi, he held the 3rd highest mark in Jordan in that year. Asha married his class mate (Da'na) and then they both embarked to the UK where Asha was supposed to finish is studies in neurosurgery. Both Asha and Da'na were arrested by the British police.

References

* [http://www.jubilee.edu.jo Official website]
*http://www.noor.gov.jo/projects2.htm