King's Academy will not open its doors until 2007, but future Headmaster Eric Widmer and King Abdullah of Jordan already have their sights set on creating a groundbreaking school.

According to Mr. Widmer, its "[reach] will be so extensive that students of various ethnicities throughout the Middle East can learn together."

Achieving this lofty goal will require two educational necessities- which the King has already agreed to.

Mr. Widmer recalled that the he and the King had "a meeting of the minds" when it came to determining that the school be coeducational and that an ambitious budget for scholarship assistance be implemented.

Outside of the United States, it is rare for independent schools to seek out students in significant numbers who are not in a position to pay tuition.

King's Academy, however, will develop a King's Scholars program aimed at recruiting students who would not normally be able to pay for a first-class education.

However, the trustees do anticipate some difficulty in persuading people who can't pay to attend because in Jordanian culture, that kind of assistance is often looked upon as embarrassing to a family.

Nevertheless, the King and the rest of the trustees see socio-economic diversity as a cornerstone of the school. "[Socio-economic] diversity means everything for the quality of education," Mr. Widmer said. And while some families may be reluctant to accept aid at first-eventually the hope is that diversity will characterize the student body of King's Academy.

King's Academy certainly breaks from traditional Jordanian educational norms in more ways than providing significant financial aid. It will also be a bilingual learning community; both English and Arabic will be used in the classrooms.

In addition to acting as headmaster, Mr. Widmer serves as the chairman of the academic planning committee. The committee met in London earlier this year to create a new timeline that will help to inform them when decisions regarding academic priorities have to be made.

While the teaching faculty have not yet been hired, it is assumed that teachers will come from both America and Jordan. Mr. Widmer also asserts that while the student to faculty ratio will be slightly higher than Deerfield's, the faculty will still "teach [the students] everything that they need to know."

Besides learning from a diverse faculty of Americans and Jordanians, students will follow a composite set of Jordanian and Deerfield-style rules and regulations.

The rules, regulations, and basic curriculum scaffolding of King's Academy will be based on Deerfield's model. It will have a weekly school meeting, sit-down, family-style meals and after class co-curriculars. The daily schedule will also model Deerfield's; classes will take place on five days with no Saturday classes.

"I think that King's Academy should be inclined to give its students every chance to succeed even if they stumble now and then-just like Deerfield does," Mr. Widmer said.

He and the rest of the trustees also hope that the school will promote strong student leadership and democracy. This convergence of thought, which is a synthesis of Deerfield thinking and the philosophy of the Round Square organization, are values that Mr. Widmer said, "All the best schools should stand for."

As a first attempt to model Deerfield's success, Mr. Widmer joked that he hopes to charter a Royal Jordanian airliner to the United States and to ask a group of Deerfield alumni to climb aboard and fly to Amman and be members of his faculty.