At a Glance

Our Story

Ugyen Academy opened on 3rd April 2002 with 154 students. It started as a pet project of Hon’ble Yab Dasho Ugyen Dorji and Yum Thinley Choden — a wish fulfilled for the local people and a hope for students who did not meet the government cut-off point.

The school made steady progress and the enrolment rose year by year. Today, it is the first and only authentic international school in the Kingdom, where wholesome education is offered in a state-of-the-art setting. The school has students from all 20 Dzongkhags in the country, alongside international students from South Korea attending regular classes.

UA is second to none in the exciting possibilities it has with the most modern facilities on campus and a faculty rich in talent and experience. For effective teaching and learning, the strength of our classes will not usually exceed 36 students. Our classrooms for classes VII and VIII have been remodelled to meet the 21st Century Transformative Pedagogy. The academic facilities are designed to include a 100,000-volume library (with a special section on Bhutan), a separate reference library and a well-equipped Audio Visual Library to cater for the digitised curriculum. The school also boasts an IT lab with broadband facilities.

In the present milieu — with erosion of values and lowering of standards in many institutions — Ugyen Academy stands out as a school with a strong value system and a code of conduct and discipline based on mutual respect. Our restorative practice Responsible Thinking Room (RTR) and Peer Mediation help build every student internally. We uphold our founder’s vision and stress on total development — head, hand and heart. We are deeply committed to instilling in our students positive traits like self-discipline and social harmony that will lead to Gross National Happiness and Global Peace.

Our Goals

• Visionary Leadership and Role Model Management Practices (show, not just tell)
• Ensure a safe and caring physical ambience — safety first
• Develop a congenial psycho-social ambience — teaching from the heart
• Work towards a customised and diversified curriculum — fostering the zeal to learn
• Be fair and standardise all tests to make them reliable and valid — Continuous and Holistic Assessment
• Plan and implement meaningful co-curricular activities — Wholesome Development: Recreational and Professional
• Develop a one-family-like school community relationship

Our Beliefs — UA CARPET

Our core values enthuse the UA family to realise our vision. Each pairing pushes us beyond the obvious — values are not single virtues but the marriage of two:

The SMART Bhutanese

Drawing from His Majesty The King’s address at the 12th Convocation of the Royal University of Bhutan (8th June 2017), we embed in our students five extraordinary qualities that define us as Bhutanese:

“Bhutan has always been a smart nation. That is why we must continue to build smart institutions, and that is why it is imperative that our people remain smart. We must nurture these wonderful qualities and remember every day, how they have defined us as a nation and as a people.” — His Majesty The King

School Core Values (Hidden Curriculum)

• Prove deep love, respect and support to our King and Chab-Je
• Put Bhutan’s sovereignty as most important
• Serve the tsa-wa-sum before self
• Build unity and harmony

*** These are what matter most to UA — nothing more, nothing less.

Strategic Priorities

• Role Model Professionals — lead by example
• School Excellence Model — focus on enabling practices
• One UA Family Culture — we are one for UA (team work)
• Innovation — never stop improving
• School in a Garden — a learning environment that is beautiful, calming and alive

Royal Visits

UA has been deeply blessed by the visits and guidance of His Majesty The King over the years. Each Royal concern has shaped how we educate.

Kidu Student

* We had Tozay(s) till 2017 but none in 2018, 2019 and 2020. However, the MoE’s kidu cases under UA scholarship were 6 annually till 2019. No more kidu cases after the cut-off point was removed in 2019.

Enrolment Growth (2002 – 2025)

From a humble 154 students in our founding year to over 1,000 today — consistent growth has gone hand-in-hand with quality.

Leadership