Saudi education sector badly hit by COVID-19 outbreak: Colliers

Saudi Arabia’s K-12 education sector has been significantly impacted by the Covid-19 outbreak, Colliers International said in a report.

“Implications are expected to last beyond the current academic year, while registration is forecast to decline by 10% or even more,” it said.

Schools will likely face pressures as regards business sustainability plans, which will oblige operators and investors to revisit their own businesses and long-term liabilities including staff costs and rental commitments.

Colliers’ survey comprised 131 educational services providers and schools from 21 cities across the Kingdom. The survey revealed that a shift towards distant learning is a “significant challenge”, as 52% of staff members and 75% of parents participating in the survey indicated that this shift is “very difficult”.

“We expect schools will operate a hybrid model (traditional and distant/online learning) for the academic year 2020-2021; parents and teachers will have enough time to adapt to the new system,” stated Colliers' director of healthcare, education and public-private partnerships (PPP) Mansoor Ahmed.

As for required additional investments, 49% of the survey participants indicated that huge investments were injected to implement the shift to the online learning, meanwhile, only 20% indicated that investments were limited.

As for the tuition fees, around 61% of participants fully or partly refunded the previously-paid tuition fees, while 32% made no refunds.

A big number of schools (52%) did not offer fee reductions due to the investment commitments related to the shift to the online learning, limited cuts of operating fixed costs and some parents’ unwillingness to pay tuition fees.

The actual impact of COVID-19 will be seen once schools commence operations at the start of the new academic year in September 2020 and will also determine how the schools will operate, i.e.; reversion to traditional schooling or a hybrid model, as operators and investors will reconsider their operating expenses.