Hanoi · History
From a Bilingual Start to Nord Anglia: BIS Hanoi at Fourteen
Founded in 2012 as a bilingual school in Long Bien District, BIS Hanoi shed its original name within a year and has since grown into one of Vietnam's most prominent British international schools under the Nord Anglia banner.
The school that families today know as the British International School Hanoi did not begin as a fully international school at all. The BIS family of schools expanded to Hanoi in 2012, opening with Anthony Rowlands as its founding Principal in the Vinhomes Riverside development in Long Bien District. Its roots, however, stretch back further, to Ho Chi Minh City, where Maurice and Rosie Nguyen opened the first British international school in Vietnam in 1997, and subsequently founded the British Vietnamese International School HCMC in August 2011 to serve families seeking a dual-language education. Hanoi was the next logical step.
Origins
BIS Hanoi was established in August 2012 as part of the BIS group of schools in Vietnam, founded to extend the success of the original British International School campuses in Ho Chi Minh City. The school opened under the name British Vietnamese International School Hanoi, a bilingual model matching the HCMC sister school. Anthony Rowlands, British-born with thirteen years of UK education experience before moving to Southeast Asia, became founding principal of BIS Hanoi in April 2012.
A New Name and a Cleaner Identity
In 2013, the British Vietnamese International School relocated from Vinhomes Riverside to the Royal City Complex in Hanoi. As a result, the Long Bien campus converted to a full international programme and became the British International School Hanoi. The two schools serving Hanoi now had distinct identities: a bilingual school at Royal City and a fully English-medium school in Long Bien. The campus at Vinhomes Riverside, on Hoa Lan Road in Phuc Loi Ward, has remained the school's home ever since.
Joining Nord Anglia
In February 2015, Nord Anglia Education announced an agreement to acquire the British International Schools Group, Vietnam, a network of four premium schools, two in Ho Chi Minh City and two in Hanoi, with the flagship BIS HCMC having been founded in 2000 and the Hanoi schools in 2012 and 2013 respectively. All four schools formally joined the Nord Anglia Education family in 2015. The deal brought BIS Hanoi into a global network then comprising 35 schools across 14 countries, and with it came access to the group's partnerships with The Juilliard School, MIT, and UNICEF, as well as Nord Anglia's professional development platform and shared digital infrastructure.
Rowlands served as founding principal of BIS Hanoi before moving to become principal of BIS HCMC in August 2017. According to Edarabia's school listing, Rebecca Carroll holds the principal role at BIS Hanoi, with Richard Vaughan previously listed in that position by the American Chamber of Commerce in Hanoi.
Curriculum and Accreditation
BIS Hanoi is a co-educational international day school for ages two to eighteen in the Vinhomes Riverside area of Long Bien District. Children follow the English Early Years Foundation Stage and the National Curriculum for England, progressing to Cambridge IGCSEs in Years 10 and 11 and the IB Diploma Programme in Years 12 and 13. Class sizes are capped at twenty-four, with small IB groups averaging eleven students.
The school has accumulated a robust set of external validations. In June 2017, BIS Hanoi was officially awarded full accreditation status with the Council of International Schools (CIS), an organisation recognised by Ministries and Departments of Education around the world. WASC accreditation followed in August 2017, making the school one of relatively few international schools in Vietnam to hold both. BIS Hanoi is also a designated IB World School. The school is a registered centre for Cambridge International Examinations.
Campus and Present Day
Located in a secure residential community just twenty minutes from Hanoi city centre, the campus provides a contained and quiet environment for learning. Facilities include a 200-seat theatre for drama, dance, and music, a STEAM Maker Space equipped with 3D printers, robotics, and laser cutters, an indoor swimming pool, a sports hall, and grass playing fields.
The school's community draws families from more than thirty different countries. Current roll stands at approximately 1,100 students. In 2026, BIS Hanoi was named in the top ten schools in Vietnam in the Edarabia Parents' Choice Awards, recognised across more than 150 institutions. Nord Anglia's global network, which now spans more than eighty schools worldwide, continues to shape the school's offer, from collaborative projects through the group's online Global Campus platform to the institutional partnerships that extend learning well beyond the classroom in Long Bien.