Al-Rissalah International School

An older Saudi-owned international school in central Riyadh that opened in Sulaymaniyah in 1998 and follows an American curriculum from KG to secondary.

RIS uses McGraw-Hill and Pearson programmes for its core American track and adds substantial Arabic, Islamic studies and French. The school runs separate boys' and girls' sections through KG, primary, intermediate and secondary, with a long-standing reputation for high pass rates in the senior years.

External signal on day-to-day life at the school is thin compared with Riyadh's larger names, and most of what surfaces sits on the school's own marketing pages. The pattern that does come through from the few independent voices is steady, traditional teaching from experienced staff, with families choosing it for an English-language American academic track inside a clearly Saudi cultural frame.

• The signal splits sharply between sources. One Saudi schools tracker carries sharply negative parent feedback; another is uniformly positive but reads partly seeded.
• One parent flagged "constant teacher turnover" and that teachers "lack proper accent" for English instruction. Another wrote, in March 2024, that the administration was "poor" and that "in the second semester some textbooks have not been delivered". A separate reviewer called it "among the worst administrations".
• Edarabia reviews are generally short praise of teachers and curriculum; one Arabic reviewer credited the teaching as "excellent" and the administration as "highly respectful and cooperative".
• The school markets American curriculum (McGraw-Hill, Pearson) and a 100% high school pass rate. No external inspection rating surfaced.
• Two operational concerns recur: teacher turnover and basic delivery (textbooks, registration). Academic outcomes themselves are not the dominant complaint.