The main reasons I chose DBS were the facilities and the teachers. Secondary to this was the location, size, fees and curriculum.
DBS is a fairly new school, it opened mid 2017 and there are positives and negatives associated with that. There were some teething problems around admin, general organization and evolving policy and procedures in the first year but everything seems to be settled now in mid 2019. On the plus side being small and new meant that everyone went out of their way to really make everyone feel welcomed, there was a lot of energy and excitement and the children were looked after very well.
It’s a couple of years old now so everyone seems to have settled in to their roles and as a whole the school seems to function very well while still being open and receptive to any concerns parents might have. For any school that charges fees and is in fact a business there is a fine line they need to walk in terms of managing the parents and children while still keeping academic and behavioral standards high and maintaining a core set of values. They seem to be doing pretty well there, in any school in any society there are always going to be a few bad eggs and trouble makers but for the most part everyone is pretty well behaved. It’s not like you can totally insulate your children from bad behavior and they have to learn to deal with it at some stage but yeah for the most part everyone is pretty well behaved.
The teachers and the facilities are excellent. They have a 400m running oval, soccer fields, basketball and tennis courts, stadium, indoor 25m pool, dance studios and the list goes on. All of the teachers are western expats, the majority of which are from England and bachelor qualified. They have some experienced staff in the upper grades and admin team while the lower grades are mostly taught by younger teachers. I think that’s fine, in the younger grades the more energy the teachers have the better.
The fees are on par with any other reputable international school in Thailand at around 600 to 700k but there was no application/ registration fees so that was a good saving of a few hundred thousand. It is located on the outskirts of Nonthaburi and that is certainly reflected in the school demographics, there are only a couple of expat parents and a hand full of international students, most of which are the teachers children.
Traffic in and around the school is normally not to bad, the car park can get a little bit hectic at drop off and pick up times. They do have a 20km/hr speed limit on school grounds and for the most part people respect this but like anywhere there are always a few aggressive drivers that speed/ undertake/ overtake/ tailgate and otherwise make a clown of themselves. Some people just don’t make the connection between driving safely and young children but what can you do, you just have to keep out of their way and look both ways twice.
For the most part it is a very good school and as it matures I think their reputation will grow and will be ranked right up there with the best. Now that they have a few hundred students they have started to implement entrance requirements and tests so raising the bar a little bit on that front will also help them attract the best and brightest going forward.
I am getting a warning that their website is not secure but here is the link.
http://www.dbsbangkok.ac.th/main/