Raffles Institution

Focus

Hope for the future

Day fees

$3,000 - $25,500

Boarding fees

$8,100 - $31,500

Pupils

4,000

Ages

13–18

Spear’s Review

Raffles Institution (RI) is one of the oldest schools in Singapore, founded in 1823 by Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, whose vision lives on in the motto, auspicium melioris aevi, meaning ‘hope of a better age’.    

The school provides secondary education for boys only in a Year 1 to Year 4 programme, and pre-university education for both boys and girls between 17 and 18. Since 2007, RI and its affiliated school, Raffles Girls’ School, have offered the Raffles Programme. This allows students to bypass the Singapore-Cambridge GCE O-Level examinations and go straight to the Singapore-Cambridge GCE A-Level examinations at the end of Year 6. 

As testament to its academic excellence, RI has one of the highest admission rates to Ivy League universities and Oxbridge; in the 2022 admissions cycle, 48 students received offers to Cambridge University.

Head teacher

Aaron Loh has been principal of the Raffles Institution since late 2023. He previously held roles at Singapore’s Ministry of Education and Commonwealth Secondary School in Singapore.

Accessibility

Singapore Changi Airport; 30 minutes

Location

Click for more information about the research process and expert insight behind the Spear’s Schools Index.