SODIC announces that it has signed an agreement with Finnish British Consortium for Investment “FBC” and Finnish Global Education Solutions “FGES” to establish the first Finnish-British school in the MENA region, Invest-Gate reports.

The agreement entails the development of Finnish British School “FBS” in SODIC East, the company’s project in New Heliopolis in East Cairo.

SODIC East is a mixed-use project spanning 655 acres. The first phases of the project are planned to be delivered this year. Thus, FBS will serve 8000 families in SODIC East as well as the larger catchment area of East Cairo.

Developed over 20,000 sqm FBS is themed as a sports-focused school that will also benefit from SODIC East’s Club S and its full array of facilities developed. Moreover, FBS is scheduled to start operating in 2023.

The first FBS in the MENA region is associated with “ESPOO International School” in Finland. Also, FBS will implement Finnish pedagogy by Finnish principals and teachers of different international backgrounds, with learning administered in English.

ESPOO will also provide learners and teachers exchange programs, exchanges on best practices, shared studies and competitions across fields and mentors on implementing the IB system.

Commenting on the signing, SODIC’s Managing Director Magued Sherif says, “It is an honor to be the first developer to bring this very strong combination of Finnish-British education to not only Egypt but the whole MENA region, offering our residents the very best in the realm of education.”

For his part, Karim El-Safty, managing director of FBC Investments, comments, “Today’s signing with leading real estate developer SODIC marks a very important milestone in FBC`s endeavour to establish six Finnish British schools and an international university in Egypt, with an initial investment cost of EGP 1.2 bn.”

It’s worth mentioning that the signing coincided with the Minister of Education and Technical Education Tarek Shawki’s first visit to Finland in an Egyptian-Finnish collaboration for knowledge exchange, where he met with FGIS as one of the companies working towards expanding the Finnish education system worldwide and commanded their efforts in introducing the Finnish education system in Egypt.

The agreement has been signed in Helsinki, Finland with the attendance of Haitham Salah, Egyptian Ambassador to Finland, Marjaana Sall, Ambassador for Education at Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, Risto Vahanen, Chairman Finnish Global Education Soultion, Jouni Kangasniemi, Programme Director of Education Finland, Magued Sherif, SODIC’s Managing Director, as well as, Karim El Safty, CEO FBC for Investment and Development.