International Community School of Addis Ababa


The International Community School of Addis Ababa, founded in 1964, is an early childhood through grade 12 school in Ethiopia. The school is located in Addis Ababa.
The school has an enrollment of nearly 1,000 students from over 67 nations. ICS Addis has been accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools since 1992. The school was accredited again in December 2014. ICS Addis has been authorized to offer the International Baccalaureate Program since March 1982.
ICS Addis is located on a 15-acre tract. The sports facility of the school includes among others a 300-meter track dedicated to Haile Gebreselassie and a newly launched multipurpose sports pavilion luxuriously sitting on an area of 2,700 square meters. The Early Childhood area, also called Little Eagles’ Nest is on a separate campus right next to the main campus. The New Classroom Building, entirely dedicated for the middle school, equipped with classrooms and laboratories themed with the 21st century personalized, hub model of learning was also launched in June 2017.

Programs

ICS Addis follows a college-preparatory American curriculum model, and the program is divided into four sections: early childhood, elementary, middle and high school. The school offers an American high school diploma to all graduates who meet graduation requirements. Almost 100% of the graduates enter higher education immediately after graduation, and 85% of the graduates attend colleges and universities in the US and Canada. Many students also pursue the IB Diploma. The school is the only testing center for the SAT in the city, but does not offer the TOEFL.
The after-school program includes sports at all age levels, drama, clubs, activities and community service opportunities. Sports teams at several age levels participate in a local league with other international and national schools. Boys and girls varsity soccer, volleyball and basketball teams also participate in the International Schools of Southern and Eastern Africa league, with seven other international schools from Mozambique, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Zambia and South Africa.
Students of the middle and high school go on four- or five-night grade level field trips to areas of Ethiopia/ overseas, in support of the science or history curricula. However, domestic trips have been cancelled for 3 years, as of 2017, with the school administration citing safety concerns.

Philosophy

The school is in a PLC journey towards becoming certified as a PLC Exemplar School. The collaborative planning in all areas of the education is guided by the four essential PLC questions:
Q1: What is it that we want our kids to know and be able to do?
Q2: How will we know they know it?
Q3: What will we do if they don't know it?
Q4 What will we do if they already know it?
With this, the school is aiming to become a highly effective, learning progressive school in which students gain solid, conceptual understanding of subject areas while maintaining the high achievement in local and international standards.
ICS is led by global thought leaders in education. The head of school, , is one of the most prominent leaders in Professional Learning Communities and personalized learning. ICS Addis has started a PLC journey of personalizing learning in which all students learn at high levels while their individual needs are met professionally. With this, the school hosted the first ever PLC at Work® institute in Africa organized by Solution Tree in October 2018. The event was held for three days and brought educators and global leaders in education like and .

Admissions

Admission is based upon completed application forms, previous school records and results from previous or current academic testing as required by the professional staff.
Placement tests at the time of application assist admissions and placement decisions. ICS does not offer part-time, partial or correspondence programs.

Events

Scholarship program

Since the early 1990s, ICS Addis has offered four 4-year scholarships every year to rising ninth graders from schools throughout Addis Ababa. The scholarships are need-blind and are based on merit.
The selection process begins in March/April with applications from the top students from public and private middle schools around the city.  Applicants are taken through a rigorous process that includes a 3-hour written test, student and parent interviews.
The Scholarship Club hosts an Ethiopian Food Sale once or twice every year. The sale includes the traditional foods of Ethiopia; both fasting and non-fasting. Besides the food sale, the Scholarship Club also hosts a garage sale every year. These are funding programs, created to help the Scholarship Club financially.
Many of the ICS scholarship students go on to win full scholarships at universities in the USA. In the past, ICS Scholarship Students have been awarded four-year scholarships to Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Vassar, Davidson, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Duke and Amherst to name a few.

Governance

The school is governed by a nine-member hybrid Board of Governors. Two members are elected for two-year terms by the ICS Addis Parent Association, six members are appointed by the Board for four-year terms and one member is appointed by the US Ambassador.

Alumni