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The Singapore offshoot of a prestigious London school has told parents it has scrapped a planned expansion weeks after an FT investigation detailed allegations of a toxic working culture, safeguarding lapses and health and safety breaches.
North London Collegiate School (Singapore), whose UK parent institution was ranked by The Sunday Times as the third-best secondary school in the UK last year, informed pupils’ parents last week that the expansion had been aborted after it became clear it might “present risks to the ethos of [the] school”.
The new campus was planned to open this summer at 20 Harbour Drive, a S$160mn ($124mn) site owned by a fund operated by Keppel, a Singapore property company part owned by state investor Temasek.
Meraki, a Dubai-based property developer that partnered with NLCS to launch the Singapore school, has decided to use the site for another international school instead, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
In the FT investigation published last month, former employees raised concerns that a profit-driven culture at NLCS (Singapore) — what some called a “bums on seats” mentality — had been prioritised over education and welfare.
Former insiders said this had created a school that did not live up to the high standards of the NLCS brand and had put staff and students at risk.
NLCS International, which manages the parent school’s overseas offshoots, said it did not recognise the characterisation of the school in the FT’s December article and that the allegations presented “a false, misleading, inaccurate and distorted picture”.
Ian Callender, NLCS International chief executive, said last month the Singapore school had always “prioritised the safety and wellbeing of our community, our values of professionalism and transparency, the rigour of our admissions process and quality of the education experience”.
One parent who removed their child from the Singapore school in the past 18 months said its senior leadership team had been a “revolving door”, which had worsened the student experience. “Schools are always going to expand but NLCS tried to take on the world in one hit,” he said.
Another parent said they had been alarmed when the plans for the new campus were originally announced. “You have so many problems at this school already and they’re expanding . . . I just don’t understand it,” they said.
NLCS International said last month: “We do not compromise standards to fill seats.”
NLCS is one of about 50 elite British private schools that have expanded overseas in the past two decades. But the FT investigation highlighted potential problems with such arrangements and how parents might be misled when a respected UK school gives its name to an overseas venture without sufficient oversight.
Callender previously said the claim the school had misled anyone was “without substance”.
As recently as late October, NLCS (Singapore) had been communicating with parents over logistics for students starting at the new campus.
But founding principal Paul Friend told parents last week that the decision had been made with Meraki in November to scrap the Harbour Drive expansion.
“We are aware of the unfortunate timing of this announcement given recent media attention. We can assure you that the two are not related,” Friend wrote in a letter seen by the FT.
An education-related investment fund operated by Keppel bought 20 Harbour Drive, a former office building near Singapore’s Pasir Panjang port, two years ago.
Meraki said the scrapping of the new NLCS (Singapore) campus plan was a “carefully considered strategic decision” that was evaluated over several months last year and had “absolutely no connection” to the FT’s reporting.
NLCS (Singapore) and Keppel declined to comment on the announcement.