RIT’s campus in Dubai flourishes
RIT Dubai
This building at RIT Dubai opened last September to host a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in new media design. The building is part of phase two of campus renovations, which will be complete in 2027.
An open ecosystem is growing amid the innovative city of Dubai, and it is emblazoned with RIT orange.
RIT Dubai, one of the university’s five global campuses, opened phase one of
its new campus in 2021 and is now on to phase two, set to be complete in 2027. The new construction will be done in two stages and will help boost the campus enrollment to 4,000 students.
The initial phase moved the campus to Dubai’s Silicon Oasis with an open, inviting layout focused on interactive learning. The 129,000-square-meter area includes a wide range of spaces designed to facilitate instruction, learning communities, research and innovation laboratories, collaborative meeting and events areas, and more. The campus was one of 10 worldwide recognized by Newsweek on its “Quirkiest College Campuses” list in 2022 for its innovative design.
RIT Dubai’s uniqueness is its vision in becoming not only an educational provider, but a thought leader in the region by contributing to the design of future universities. The campus has been working toward establishing collaborations and industry partnerships both locally and globally to create an open ecosystem.
RIT Dubai has more than 35 active strategic partners that participate in career fairs, co-ops, workshops, and trainings for students, faculty, and staff. These partnerships lead to discussions related to current challenges in the career field and allow students and faculty members to use their expertise to work on real-world projects.
“It’s a full-campus experience,” said RIT Dubai President Yousef Al Assaf. “We can help the public and the private sector achieve their goals and can exchange ideas of research, teaching, and learning. The best way to predict the future is to design it, so creating this ecosystem with the support of the Dubai government allows us to create a new kind of education that is more accessible to people and solves global problems.”
Phase two began with construction of the new media design building, which opened in September 2024 to support the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in new media design.
Phase two will include a sustainability and energy center, which focuses on developing renewable energy and green technologies, and a smart cities center, which aims to create innovative technologies for interconnected, smart, urban environments.
Other building plans for phase two are an auditorium that can seat 1,500 people, an extension of the current innovation center, and a center for people of determination to support those with special needs.
The growth of RIT Dubai’s campus represents the increasing enrollment across all of RIT’s campuses.
RIT Croatia-Dubrovnik, RIT Croatia-Zagreb, RIT Kosovo, and RIT China have also seen an increase in program offerings and in enrollment. These global campuses allow students to have unique, international experiences and opportunities and to work with state-of-the-art technologies and diverse cultures, people, and environments.
“Our global campuses, like RIT Dubai, provide new research and international experience opportunities for students in the respective regions and for those studying at our main campus in Rochester,” said James Myers, associate provost for International Education and Global Programs. “The growth of all our campuses shows how RIT is making a worldwide impact.”