Page 293 - UAE Truncal States

Chapter Seven

the domain of the mulawwa', who ran a kutlab where children, boys
and girls, learned the Koran by rote and also learnt to read and write.
Modern schooling on theTrucial Coast was first provided with the
help of the British government in Sharjah in 1953. From 1954
onwards the government of Kuwait built, equipped and staffed
several schools in the six northern Trucial States.51 The government
of Dubai was not inactive, the Ruler even turned his summer palace
into a temporary school for the winter months in 1958. The Ruler
asked the education authorities in Cairo for more teachers, who came
under the control of a United Arab Republic’s educational mission
which had been established in Sharjah. Dubai’s own school-building
programme started during the 1960s, and by the time education was
handed over to the Federal Ministry of Education of the UAE in 1972,
16 boys’ schools and 12 girls’ schools had been built and were in use.
It is significant that in the development of education in Dubai
emphasis has been given to technical education. A trade school with
an initial intake of boys mostly from Sharjah and Dubai opened in
Sharjah in 19 5 852 and was funded by the British Government. Shaikh
Rashid bin SaTd, who foresaw the benefit of a technical education for
his young citizens and for the future development of the town, put up
the sum of over £30,000 to have a trade school and accommodation
built in Dairah under the supervision of the principal of the school in
Sharjah. The running costs of the school were shared equally
between the Ruler of Dubai and the British Government until March
1967, when all the expenditure became the responsibility of the
Trucial States Development Fund. The Dubai Trade School was
extended in early 1966 to allow a commercial course to be added to
the curriculum,53 and further additions, with pre-technical courses
and two extra post-technical years at secondary school level, brought
the entire curriculum to twelve years of education. At the end of 1968
there were 194 students enrolled at the Trade School in Dubai. The
accelerating economic development of the City State in the late 1960s
already gave a foretaste of the employment opportunities that lay in
store for young local people who had gone through a practical
education and were willing to apply their knowledge and skills.

Police force
The establishment in 1956 of a police force was a significant step in
the process of transforming Dubai into a well-organised State
prepared to develop an ever more diversified economy and an
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