How I Found the Right International Cambridge School in Riyadh for My Kids
I was sitting at my go-to cardamom latte spot on Olaya Street three years ago, crumbs of a sesame cookie scattered across a pile of crumpled school brochures, my older daughter coloring the school logos on the back of each one, while my phone died halfway through scrolling Google results for “international Cambridge school in Riyadh”. We’d just moved back to Riyadh from Dubai, and my two kids, aged 7 and 10, needed a new school by the start of term in six weeks. I’d already crossed three schools off my list for one reason or another, and I was starting to think I’d never sort this out before the deadline.
We’d settled on a Cambridge curriculum early on because we didn’t have a fixed long-term plan. If we stayed in Riyadh, Cambridge is widely accepted by every local and international university in the region. If we moved back to the UK or to Europe for university, the credentials transfer seamlessly, more so than many other curricula. That flexibility was non-negotiable for us. But what I didn’t expect was how many schools advertised themselves as Cambridge-aligned when they didn’t actually offer the full pathway we needed.
The first school I toured was a new campus out near the Northern Ring Road, with sprawling sports fields and a shiny auditorium. The only problem was the bus ride from our house would have been an hour each way. My older daughter gets motion sickness, and I didn’t want her spending two hours a day on a bus before she even started her homework. That was an easy no. The next school was a well-known international institution that put “Cambridge” front and center on its website, but when I read the fine print, they only offered IGCSE for two years of secondary, then switched to AP for sixth form. That wasn’t going to work for us, since we wanted the full continuous pathway through A-levels.
I stopped scrolling through sponsored Google results and turned to the three local parent groups I’d joined after moving back—one for expat families, one for Saudi parents looking for international education. Instead of asking “what’s the best Cambridge school in Riyadh,” I asked “what do you wish you’d known before enrolling your kid in a Cambridge curriculum school here?” The responses were all unfiltered, and the first tip that came up over and over was one I never thought of: check Cambridge International’s official public school directory first.
I went to the Cambridge website, filtered for schools in Riyadh, and only kept schools that were fully accredited for all four stages: Cambridge Primary, Cambridge Lower Secondary, IGCSE, and A-levels. That immediately cut my list of 12 schools down to 4. So many schools advertise they’re “Cambridge affiliated” but only offer one or two stages, so this quick free check saves hours of wasted time researching options that don’t fit your needs.
Next, I filtered those 4 by commute. I live and work near central Riyadh, so I crossed off the one that was 40 minutes away in the new northern development, even though it had lower tuition. I knew the daily drive would add too much stress to our routine, and it wasn’t worth the savings. That left three schools. Then I scheduled visits, but I didn’t sign up for the weekend open houses. I emailed each admissions office and asked if I could come on a weekday morning, during regular school hours, to see what a normal day looked like. All three agreed, which was a good sign right away—if a school won’t let you see it running as usual, that’s a red flag to me.
After the standard admissions tour, I asked for two things: could I sit in on a class matching my kids’ grade levels for 10 minutes, and could they connect me to a current parent of kids in those grades for a quick chat. That’s where I got the real information no brochure tells you. At one of the three schools, the parent I spoke to told me four primary teachers had left at the end of the last school year, because of low pay and inconsistent management. High teacher turnover means kids have to adjust to new adults and new teaching styles constantly, which is extra hard when you’re already switching schools and curricula. That crossed that school off the list.
The last remaining option was a campus just off King Abdulaziz Road, 15 minutes from my house. Class sizes were 18 in primary, 22 in secondary, which was small enough that teachers could notice if a kid was struggling. The parent I chatted with said her son had been there for five years, and only one teacher had left in that time. When I asked about fees, I learned they included all Cambridge exam fees in the annual tuition—something the other two schools charged an extra 2,000 to 3,000 SAR per exam for. For A-levels, that adds up to thousands of extra riyals at the end of two years, so that was a huge unexpected win.
My younger daughter has mild dyslexia, so I asked about learning support. The other schools wanted me to pay extra for small group or one-on-one support, but this school includes it as part of regular student services, with a full-time learning support coordinator who meets with kids once a week if they need it, no extra fee. That sold me.
We enrolled them, and it’s been two and a half years now. It’s not perfect. The canteen doesn’t have many vegetarian options, which my younger daughter prefers, so I pack her lunch most days. The after-school art club my older daughter loves only runs twice a week, so we do extra drawing at home on the off day. Some days I still wonder if we’d be happier at one of the bigger schools further out.
But right now, it works for our family. We still don’t know if we’ll stay in Riyadh until the kids graduate, or if we’ll move to the UK in three years. But because the school follows the full accredited Cambridge pathway, their credits will transfer smoothly no matter what we decide. That’s the thing I learned that I didn’t understand when I started my search: the right international Cambridge school in Riyadh isn’t the same for every family. It’s the one that fits your commute, your budget, and your kid’s specific needs, not the one with the biggest marketing budget or the fanciest football stadium.
If you’re just starting your search now, start with that official Cambridge directory, ask unfiltered questions in local parent groups, and visit on a regular school day instead of a polished open house. Those three small steps will save you so much of the stress I felt sitting in that coffee shop with a dead phone and a pile of useless brochures.
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