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International and other migrant schools in Gulf Cooperation Council countries

As the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries’ economies have rapidly grown over the past half-century, they have consistently relied on migrant workforces to fill labour market shortfalls. In order to attract economic migrants, GCC countries have established education systems to support the educational needs of the children of these migrants. However, they have largely relied on private schools where access and quality are linked to a person’s ability to pay fees. Today, students from migrant backgrounds comprise the majority of students in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, and they make up significant percentages of students in the other four GCC countries. This report explores the challenges of educating large numbers of non-citizens in a region where policies have been designed to ensure their residency is largely temporary.1 It begins by providing a brief landscape of GCC demographics, and it then examines GCC education systems and how they impact the welfare of migrant children, families and the state. It next discusses the implications for the public education sector and concludes with an examination of challenges of having parallel education systems within a single country.