Rihab Zahraa High School - Imam Sadr Foundation

Rihab Zahraa(as) High School

A comprehensive school, from kindergarten to Baccalaureate.

The Imam Sadr Foundation’s educational journey was launched based on two main pillars: education and knowledge. In light of its vision, education is a cornerstone for an aware and civilized society, while knowledge and expertise are the foundation for Lebanon’s bright future.

Rihab Zahraa(as) High School was established in this context and educates students from kindergarten to high school. It is distinguished by its inclusive educational program designed to integrate special education students into the general educational system.

A Brief History of the School

In 1978, following the Lebanese Civil War and the war with the Israeli enemy, as well as the spread of ignorance, poverty, and disease resulting from the deteriorating economic and social conditions, Imam Sadr established a boarding school in Zahra City in Khalde, Beirut. This school provided care for orphaned girls and those with special social needs from all regions of Lebanon. The school took in students from Beit Alfatat, providing education from the first to the fifth grade and following a curriculum focused on progress and precision in education.

Kindergarten Department

The preschool department for girls and boys aged between 3-5 years from all social backgrounds aims to prepare children for schooling. This is done through unlocking their potential and developing their skills and capacities to allow them to represent the culture of their community and contribute to its development and progress, bearing in mind the thought of Imam Sadr and his educational and humanitarian visions.

In 1999, the kindergarten department began implementing child-centered curricula aimed at comprehensive child development. Classrooms were rich spaces offering a variety of interactive activities to enhance children’s independence and foster creative and critical thinking. In 2008, the curricula witnessed a second significant upgrade in line with the Ministry of Education and Higher Education’s guidelines and international developments related to early childhood education. This upgrade encouraged children to recall, organize and apply acquired resources to achieve the necessary learning competencies.

Elementary School Department

The Imam Sadr Foundation ensures that children continue their education within the foundation after finishing kindergarten. In this framework, and since 1999, it has equipped its classrooms and teachers with the help of experts to implement the latest educational curricula in the elementary school department, covering the first, second, and third cycles. The educational curricula in elementary education have seen successive developments, in line with the Lebanese Ministry of Education’s official curricula and global educational updates. A competency-based approach has been therefore applied.

Secondary Education Department

Human education is at the core of the Imam Sadr Foundation’s educational philosophy, defined by the strategic framework “What Kind of Human Do We Want?” The Foundation thus aimed to continue its educational methodology and translate its vision of the ideal human through the end of the school phase.

The school completed its educational stages after receiving a license for a private high school on September 22, 2017. The secondary department was established to build upon the efforts of Imam Sadr Foundation, which had previously operated a free school that initially offered up to the fifth grade and added the sixth grade in the 2000-2001 academic year. The school, named Rihab Zahraa(as) High School, gradually began opening its secondary classes within the 2018-2019 academic year.

Inclusive Education

The Imam Sadr Foundation strongly believes in the potential of every student, regardless of their circumstances, and encourages everyone to learn and confidently integrate into society. This commitment led to the transformation of Rihab Zahraa(as) High School into an inclusive educational system in the 2019-2020 academic year, enabling every student to exercise their right to education within a learning environment that respects everyone’s abilities. This transition followed a series of preparatory measures within a plan that covered all school departments, especially with the shift in the educational process in Lebanon towards inclusive education, accompanied by measures taken by the Ministries of Education and Higher Education and Social Affairs.