Here’s a private secondary school that’s different from the rest with its flexible enrolment dates for lower secondary, IGCSE and A Level courses, small class sizes, and low fees.

The Insworld Institute offers a traditional British education to secondary students. However, it’s the school’s rolling enrolment, small class sizes, free one-to-one support classes, and life skills programmes that really stand out from the norm.

Located in central Singapore, Insworld offers the benefits and strengths of a small school. It can meet the individual needs of students with its small class sizes of 4-12 students.

Founded in 2000, the school has a truly international student population of 20-30 different nationalities; there's a highest number of Singaporean, Chinese and British students.

Curriculum

Insworld enrols students year-round, offers courses in January, March, July, and September, and runs three external exams annually. This offers families a huge degree of flexibility and choice if relocating from other parts of the world throughout the academic year. 

Whatever course they study, every student has guidance from a personal tutor, and the option of one-to-one tutoring with any of the specialist subject teachers, at no additional cost.

While Insworld lacks the large campus, state of the art facilities, and feel of many international and private schools in Singapore, it does offer a very focused approach to studying secondary and college courses for students. It will also suit students looking for that extra level of learning support, as teaching can (and is) adapted to meet the needs of individual students.

The school focuses on pre-high school courses such as Edexcel International Tuition Programme (EITP). The EITP is a lower secondary programme for students in Years 7-9 that’s benchmarked to Key Stage Three of the National Curriculum for England, and gives students the foundation for IGCSEs.

In the EITP,  students study a small but broad curriculum that includes mathematics, English language, science (biology, chemistry, physics), and humanities (geography and history); they can choose to study art and Chinese.

Insworld specialises in preparing students for UK benchmarked exams, including Pearson Edexcel International Advanced Level, GCE A-Level, and IGCSEs. The IGCSE and A Level programmes each last 18 months, which means a quicker alternative to the standard two academic years taken by most schools.

The school offers a variety of different courses, but its strongest focus is on the sciences (chemistry, physics, biology) and business. One of the school's strengths is its course-choosing system, allowing students to try subjects for their first week to decide if it is 'right for them'.

All students study English Language and mathematics at IGCSE, and choose an extra four or more subjects from the list of accounting, art and design, biology, business studies, commerce, chemistry, Chinese, economics, English literature, further pure mathematics, history, physics, and ICT.

It is a registered centre for Pearson Edexcel exams, and one of only a very few schools in Singapore to offer A Levels. The vast majority – around 90% – of students continue with tertiary education after leaving Insworld with their qualifications.

As well as offering a wide choice of subjects in each programme, Insworld runs an intensive English for Academic Studies programme.

Beyond the classroom

Learning is supported by extra-curricular activities such as basketball, badminton, dance, futsal, and taekwondo.

Although Insworld is a school with several intakes of students every year, it manages to build a close-knit community of students. With a total of just 100 students in the school, most of them know each other and there are close friendships across the different cohorts – something which can be harder to achieve in a larger school. However, as a smaller, private school it cannot compete with larger schools in terms of extra-curricular activities, sport and the arts.

However, it does have various programmes in place to bring students together and add a social element to their learning journey. These include an annual leadership camp, a cultural festival to celebrate the multi-nationalism at the school, and an annual Team Building and Barbecue Party.

Campus and facilities

Insworld Institute does not have the 'wow' factor of many international schools, but it does a very central, easily accessible location. Its two campuses in the National Library Building and in the North Bridge Centre have several classrooms that are basic but modern and spacious.

Well-suited to the school's focus on academia, the school is certainly more functional than fashionable – and parents should focus their attention very much on what goes on in the classroom here, rather than what it may look like.

Admission and fees

Insworld is a non-selective school that is well suited to students of all abilities (including those with mild to moderate learning needs such as ASD, ADHD and dyslexia). 

Fees vary according to the course taken and are lower than those paid at many international schools. The annual cost for the EITP is $21,000, and for IGCSEs and A Levels it is $22,500.

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