by Mona Mahadevan The New Haven independent
Dr. Leo Lester shaking hands with Director Basim Ibrahim. Credit: University of New Haven
On the same day that President Donald Trump threatened to destroy Iranian civilization, the University of New Haven (UNH) received approval from an accreditor to launch the first American branch campus in another part of the region: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
If all goes to plan, classes in the College of Business and Digital Innovation will begin for thousands of Saudi students in Fall 2026.
Leo Lester, the UNH professor leading the West Haven-based university’s expansion into Riyadh, told the Independent that people closest to this project are the ones least concerned about risks from the current U.S.-Israel-Iran conflicts. In fact, he said, UNH recently acquired a campus property within the city limits of Riyadh.
As UNH enters the Middle East, other schools are fleeing. American universities with outposts in the Gulf have canceled classes or temporarily closed, after Iran warned that their campuses are considered “legitimate targets.” Some schools — such as the American University of Beirut, one of the oldest American colleges in the Middle East — had already switched classes online due to Israel’s bombing of Lebanon.
Even so, Lester remains confident forging ahead on UNH’s Riyadh branch.
In Saudi Arabia, “hundreds of thousands of high school students [are] unable to secure a higher education placement,” said Lester. “That demographic is not going to go away because there’s a war in another country.”
He pointed out that even amid the conflict, there are still daily flights to Saudi Arabia (albeit with a U.S. Department of State travel advisory).
“We’re making a long-term project: something that will go on for generations,” he said. For that, the key question is whether “there are people in Saudi Arabia that want to go to university.”
The Riyadh branch would mark UNH’s second international campus, with the other in Prato, Italy.
Four thousand students have already expressed interest in enrolling, said Lester, showing the demand for an American-style education in Saudi Arabia’s capital city. Approval from the New England Commission of Higher Education (NECHE), announced Tuesday, adds a stamp of credibility to their school’s pitch.
In a press release sent Tuesday, UNH President Jens Frederickson celebrated the accreditation. The approval “strengthens our global presence” and “reinforces our commitment to providing transformative learning opportunities for students from across the globe,” he is quoted as saying.
As UNH continues touting its Riyadh expansion, officials have been reticent about how the campus is being financed.
Like the West Haven campus, the business model for UNH’s Riyadh branch is “tuition-driven,” said Lester. The university lists the annual tuition in Riyadh at $28,000, about half what tuition costs at the West Haven campus, $49,320.
To pay for the upfront costs of establishing the branch, UNH raised capital “in the same way that the university funds any of its projects,” he said.
When questioned about whether the upfront capital came from American or Saudi funders, Lester declined to comment, asking, “Why does that matter?”
The university’s funds “come from all sorts of sources,” he said. “There’s nothing nefarious or opaque about it.”
Long before UNH announced its plans to expand into Riyadh, the university had already built a substantial financial relationship with Saudi Arabia. UNH received $21.6 million from Saudi Arabia across 16 transactions since January 2019, according to the federal government’s tracker for foreign gifts to universities. At least $11 million came directly from the government, including $1.8 million in tuition payments for Saudi students.
A university spokesperson stated that tuition would pay for the campus’s operating expenses. Like Lester, he did not share how the school is funding the branch’s start-up costs.
Other Middle Eastern countries, such as Qatar, spend hundreds of millions annually to subsidize U.S. branches. Saudi Arabia’s regulations, however, require international universities to pay their own expenses.
Somehow, UNH has found a way to do so, even while facing financial challenges at home.
Three weeks ago, dozens of faculty members at UNH’s West Haven campus were told that their contracts may not be renewed. Due to a decrease in international student enrollment, the university’s student body has declined from 9,000 to slightly above 6,000 over the past two years. Their most recent tax filings show a slim profit of $5 million, though their net assets are still worth over $273 million.
The Boston Globe reported that UNH sees the Riyadh campus as an answer to its financial woes. In the long term, UNH aims to enroll 13,000 students at its Riyadh campus, according to a press release sent Tuesday. The university also plans to establish a College of Engineering and Advanced Manufacturing and a College of Arts and Applied Sciences.
It might seem surprising for UNH to become the first American university to open a Saudi branch, but their relationship with the country stretches back decades. Over that period, the university claims to have educated “thousands” of Saudi students, both on campus and abroad.
Critics have questioned that relationship for years, pointing to the country’s record of human rights violations and involvement with the humanitarian crisis in Yemen.
More recently, the oil-rich country has focused on diversifying its economy and liberalizing socially. At the same time, the country’s monarch, Mohammed bin Salman, has consolidated political power and created a zero-tolerance policy for dissent.
Lester, a professor of criminal justice, responded to critics of Saudi Arabia by saying, “I’m in the business of education, not of politics.” He pointed out that no one opposes Saudis going to the U.S. to get an education.
In an interview with the Independent, Bernard Haykel, a Princeton professor and expert on the Middle East, argued that American schooling can have a “transformative effect” on authoritarian countries.
Western campuses — such as the American University of Beirut (AUB) — have educated generations of engineers, doctors, writers, and political activists, he said. AUB improved Lebanon’s economic development, lifted people out of poverty, and gave students access to progressive political ideas.
“If you’re hoping to effect change, improve human capital, and slowly and gradually open up these societies and make them more liberal, tolerant, and democratic, that’s a process that will take time,” he said.
Academic freedom, he stressed, is an essential feature of such enterprises. “I’m not against engaging with authoritarian governments on one condition,” he said. “That those governments don’t impose restrictions on what can be taught, and how it can be taught.”
Lester told the Independent that Saudi Arabia has placed “no restrictions on the curriculum” at the Riyadh campus. “Every country has its own cultural context. You operate within that cultural context,” he said.