TIL’A AL-ALI
1970
Til’Al’Ali is situated in a district to the north east of Amman in a mixed economic area where there is some unemployment.
The school was established in 1967. At first it was for Kindergarten with the addition of the first four grades in 1987 and occupied a building of two floors. Unfortunately there were only a few pupils in each year, consequently the first and second grades were taught together.
The construction of the present school took place between 1992 and 1995 when Father Anton added a third floor to accommodate four classes. This enabled the school to cater for the fifth and sixth grades. At the same time the Kindergarten was moved into the basement.
In 2000 another grade, the seventh, was added, followed by an increase in the number of children in this grade in 2003.
Four years ago the old entrance was moved, making way for the lobby to be partitioned to provide an office for the financial assistant.
More recently other developments have taken place. After the building of a new church further away three years ago, the original church has become a hall, with multipurpose use. The original staff room is now a small kitchen and the Principal’s office is in what was originally the parish room. The rooms where the priest lived have become two offices for the secretary and financial assistant. The entrance to the playground was changed so that the four buses, used for transporting the children to and from school, could park in a safer area.
After the 7th grade, about 5 to 6% of the children go to either Fuheis or government schools.
There is land nearby available for development, which should enable the school to cater for the 8th to 12th grades. This would stop the loss of the older Catholic children who, after the 7th grade, transfer to private or government schools.
There are large numbers of Christian children arriving from Iraq at the moment which is causing overcrowding and making it impossible to take any more pupils.
The standard of education compares very well with other good private schools in the area. If it would be possible to build a school, similar to Wassieh, in Amman, it would not only cater for the secondary needs of the area, but also provide a good source of income with a larger number of families being able to afford the full fees.
The outside play space is very limited with the toilets for the children involving a long journey from the classrooms across the playground with frequent ‘accidents’ in winter. There is a big need to reorganise the buildings to utilize the site in a more efficient way and provide inside facilities. The Kindergarten in particular has an extremely small, enclosed area for outside play.
Inside there are very good displays of the childrens work on the walls of the corridors.
Staffing problems are experienced when teachers attend courses to up-grade their qualifications and then leave for better-paid work in other private or government schools.
The school had a staff consisting of the Principal with 27 female teachers, four of these are teaching in the Kindergarten. There is a secretary and financial assistant with three administrative assistants. A guard lives on the premises.
About half the children are transported to school using four buses.
The Kindergarten has two classes for each year. The children are taught using the Montessori method of discussion, one class in Arabic and one in English.
Each of the seven grades has two classrooms for each Grade, there is one laboratory with twenty computers, a science laboratory and a library. Besides the multi-purpose room there is a small chapel where Mass is celebrated, usually every two weeks.
L I N K S to the schools >>>>>>>>>>