About Elizabeth
School advice shaped by fifteen years inside education.
Elizabeth Harding has spent fifteen years in schools in the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates, the last ten in Dubai, much of that time in senior leadership.
She has taught across the British curriculum and worked within Dubai’s international school sector. It is that experience, more than anything, that she brings to families.
Most parents, and most advisers, only ever see schools from the outside: the prospectus, the inspection rating, the open morning. Elizabeth has known them from within. She has been in the leadership meetings where admissions decisions are made, in the classrooms where a child either settles or doesn’t, and in the inspection weeks that produce the ratings families read.
It means she knows what to look for on a visit, which questions are worth asking, and what a school is weighing up when it considers an application.
She works with families moving to the UAE and with families already here who want a change. Most are in a similar position when they first get in touch. There isn’t much time, the list of schools is long, and it is an important decision that can have a big influence on how a child experiences the move. Often there is more than one child to think about, and the question of where to live as well. It can feel like a lot, and it is much easier with someone alongside you who knows how the system works.
In brief
- Fifteen years in schools
- United Kingdom and United Arab Emirates
- Ten years in Dubai
- International school sector
- Senior leadership
- Much of her career
- British curriculum
- Teaching and leadership
Qualifications
- BA (Hons) Primary Education
- First Class
- TEFL qualification
- Awarded with distinction
- National Professional Qualification for Senior Leadership
- NPQSL
Her training is in primary education and school leadership, and most of her career has been spent in British curriculum schools. That is what helps most when a family is comparing schools and trying to picture where their child will settle.
Why independent matters
Elizabeth is paid by families and by no one else. She takes no commission, referral fee or introduction fee from any school, so there is never a financial reason for her to point you towards one school rather than another. The only question is which school will suit your child.
It is always fair to ask an adviser who is paying them. For Elizabeth, the answer is only ever the family.
Why the number of families is limited
Elizabeth keeps the number of families she works with small because doing this properly takes time. For the families she supports through admissions there are availability checks with schools, preparation before visits and a conversation afterwards, help with applications and documents, and a good many calls and messages along the way, some of them at short notice. When offers arrive, there needs to be time to talk them through calmly.
She couldn’t give that attention to many more families at once, so she doesn’t try. It also means that when you ring, she knows exactly who you are.
No adviser can promise a place, because the final decision always rests with the school. What Elizabeth can do is help your child apply to the right schools, well prepared and in good time.
Judgement
What experience changes.
From the outside, schools are compared on ratings, results and fees. Having worked inside Dubai schools, Elizabeth looks at the same choice from the other side, and weighs what a prospectus cannot show. A recommendation is never a league table; it is a judgement about one child.
- The child, first
- How your child learns, what helps them settle, anything a new school would need to know, and what has gone well or less well so far. Every other question follows from this.
- The learning environment
- Class sizes, pace, pastoral care and the expectations placed on children vary a great deal, even between schools with the same rating.
- Curriculum fit
- British, IB, American or another route: which suits this child now, and what each choice means for exams, universities or a later move.
- Culture and leadership
- How a school is led shapes what it is like day to day. Time inside schools helps in reading that culture, and in knowing which questions to ask on a visit.
- Admissions realities
- Where a place is realistic for your child’s year group and timing, how each school assesses, and which deadlines cannot move. No outcome can be guaranteed, but a realistic shortlist saves a great deal of time.
- Location and the daily journey
- Where you live and how long the school run takes shape family life every day, so school and home are best considered together.
- The longer view
- Brothers and sisters, exam years, a possible future move: the right school now should still make sense in two or five years’ time.
Whatever the engagement, Elizabeth’s aim is the same: to make the decision clearer, and to leave the family with only the choices that genuinely need them.
Begin with a private conversation.
The place to start is an introductory call of up to thirty minutes, at no charge: a chance to understand where you are and which kind of support would suit your family.
Request a free introductory callor message on WhatsApp
Elizabeth replies personally, usually within the same working day.