Spencer Withrington
International Manager
As the name suggests, Richmond, the American International University in London is a truly unique global institution. Established in 1972 by Sir Cyril Taylor, a British educator and social entrepreneur, who founded the American Institute for Foreign Study in 1964, Richmond, in its early years, served mainly to house study abroad programs to the American students. However, this changed in 1981 when Richmond obtained a license to award the U.S. undergraduate degrees from the Washington DC Board of Education and formal accreditation from the Middle States Association of Schools and Colleges (now the Middle States Commission on Higher Education).
Since then, Richmond’s reputation grew quickly as an independent liberal university that offer the U.S.-accredited and UK- validated duel degrees. This means that when a student graduates from Richmond, they get two degrees, one from the UK and one from the U.S.“We have mixed the two strongest education systems around the world, taking the flexibility and choice “We have mixed the two strongest education systems around the world, taking the flexibility and choice around the globe.