September 2026: Investment, Openings, and a Back-to-School Surge Across the UAE and Saudi Arabia

Regulatory change, fresh capital, and a wave of new campuses are converging on the region, and back-to-school numbers in the UAE are strong. Riyadh just rewrote the rulebook on who can invest in a Saudi classroom and is rolling AI tools into its curriculum, Dubai welcomed one of Britain's oldest state schools while adding 26 new private institutions of its own, and UAE-based investors are even taking that momentum abroad, opening a school in Kazakhstan.

The National: Queen Elizabeth's School in Dubai becomes first UK state school to open in UAE

Queen Elizabeth's School, Barnet, a selective state grammar with a 450-year history, has welcomed 350 pupils to its first international campus, in Dubai Sports City, as the new term begins. The opening, delivered in partnership with GEDU Global Education, marks the first time an English state school has opened a fee-paying campus abroad, with the Dubai site following the National Curriculum for England from Nursery through to Year 8 ahead of a planned phased expansion into the Sixth Form.

Arab News: Major Saudi education reforms include variable hours for teachers, AI tools and 37,500 promotions

Saudi Arabia's education minister has unveiled reforms for the new school year that ban teachers from working outside their specialisms, introduce AI tools to cut administrative workload, promote more than 37,000 educational and administrative staff, and let individual schools set working hours around their own needs. The ministry also updated 22 subjects and added 50 AI learning units to the curriculum, delivered 36 million textbooks to schools before the summer break, and set a goal of raising early-childhood-education enrolment from 35 to 90 per cent by 2030.

Asharq Al-Awsat: Saudi Arabia opens education sector to private and non-profit investment

A royal decree approving Saudi Arabia's new General Education System has created a clearer regulatory framework for private and non-profit participation in public education, as part of the Kingdom's Vision 2030 goals. Finance experts note that foreign direct investment stocks in Saudi education reached $914.7 million at the end of 2024, more than 13 times their level a decade earlier, while eight education and training companies are now listed on the Saudi stock market, generating around $906.7 million in revenue in 2025 alone.

Dubai Eye 103.8: UAE schools to welcome over 1.2 million students for new academic year

The UAE Ministry of Education says the country's education system is fully ready for the 2026-27 academic year, with more than 1.27 million pupils returning to over 1,180 public and private schools this week. The Ministry has opened 11 new schools and educational complexes, scrapped homework for pupils from Kindergarten to Grade 2 in favour of daily reading at home, and expanded its programme regulating digital device use to all Grade 6 public school pupils following a successful pilot.

Dubai Media Office: Dubai's private education sector expands with new institutions opening across the emirate

Twenty-six new private education institutions are opening in Dubai for the 2026-27 academic year, including 17 early childhood centres, seven schools and two higher education campuses, adding nearly 17,000 new school seats. The KHDA reports 4.6 per cent annual growth across early years, schools and higher education over the past three years despite last year's regional disruption, alongside a 29 per cent rise in higher education enrolment and a 17.5 per cent increase in the number of private-sector teachers.

Kursiv Media: UAE investors open $30 million school in Astana

A group of UAE investors, including Emirates Global Education Investment Group, Mazrui International and SABIS Holding, has opened SABIS International School Astana, a $30 million campus built at the request of Kazakhstan's president following his visit to the UAE. The nine-hectare site can accommodate 3,400 pupils and is the first school in Kazakhstan to run the SABIS system, with investors planning to allocate up to $45 million in total as UAE-based education money continues to look for growth beyond the Gulf.