Saudi Arabia’s government gave approval this week for the University of New Haven to open a branch campus in Riyadh, potentially paving the way for the university to become the first in the world to do so.

The university anticipates opening the campus next fall and eventually teaching 13,000 undergraduate and grad students—the institution’s U.S. enrollment is under 10,000. University president Jens Frederiksen told Inside Higher Ed on Wednesday that he hopes to reach that enrollment goal in a decade. In a news release, he said the university’s “commitment to international education has generated significant global attention and awareness.”

Frederiksen told Inside Higher Ed he thinks there’s been “a bit of a paradigm shift in the kingdom,” from sending Saudi students abroad to study to now bringing international institutions into the country.

“I think we were sort of on the cusp of that wave,” he said, adding that “we have an opportunity to deliver some cutting-edge education that’s sought after into a marketplace where there’s an incredible demand for talent.”

A university news release said the campus will advance “the Kingdom’s transformative Vision 2030 goals,” a plan to diversify and grow the country’s current oil-reliant economy. The country says it’s privatizing government services and trying to prepare workers for new economic sectors, and its government has touted decreasing unemployment and increasing participation by women in the workforce.

Other universities are also aiming to establish branch campuses in Saudi Arabia, but the University of New Haven may beat those institutions to the finish line. New Haven has been a partner of the Saudi royal family since the late ’90s, but Frederiksen said he doesn’t think that was a factor in this week’s approval.

The race for more branch campuses in Saudi Arabia reflects how the current geopolitical landscape is shaping global plans for U.S. universities. Some are rethinking partnerships in China and Qatar while others are seeing opportunities for expansion in India.

It’s also another example of colleges’ growing ties to the wealthy nation. Australia’s University of Wollongong says it plans to open a Riyadh campus this year, but it was unclear Wednesday whether it had yet received approval from Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s cabinet. Other universities have established research collaborations, consulting agreements and other financial ties in the past. Times Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed’s parent company, is holding its World Academic Summit in Saudi Arabia this week.

But universities’ past partnerships with the nation have been controversial in light of its human rights record, which has included mass executions and, in the past, public beheadings.

In 2016, the University of New Haven signed an agreement with King Fahd Security College to help it create a bachelor’s degree in security studies with specialization tracks in homeland security, intelligence studies and criminal justice. In 2018, the university faced pressure to end the partnership after Saudi agents killed Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in a Saudi consulate in Turkey—an assassination the crown prince approved himself, according to a U.S. intelligence report the Biden administration released.

But the university refused to back down. On the website for its Riyadh branch, it claims that from 2016 to 2021, “We modernized the King Fahd Security College from a training center to an accredited military college. We developed and directed the undergraduate program.”

Mario Gaboury, the University of New Haven’s vice president for government affairs and global engagement, said he was dean of the College of Criminal Justice and Forensic Sciences during the partnership with King Fahd. Gaboury said the security college technically trains students who operate outside the military in police, border guard and other roles.

New Haven’s Riyadh branch website traces the university’s partnership with Saudi Arabia back to the late ’90s, when it started offering “private education to the Royal Family, delivering more than 40 degrees in Riyadh.” Gaboury said that, according to the person who ran that program, the university taught a relatively small number of students, who received business management degrees.

The site says the Riyadh branch will only teach in English and will offer a “Preparatory Year Program and an English as a Second Language (ESL) course.” It will include three colleges: business and digital innovation, engineering and advanced manufacturing, and arts and applied sciences. It says it will provide “executive education” and “micro-credentials to support lifelong learning” including in areas such as “Leadership for Women” and “AI & Machine Learning.”

Gaboury said the campus will have coed students and faculty, and he doesn’t “foresee any restrictions in terms of academic freedom.”

The university isn’t done with its stateside approvals to open the Riyadh campus. It now needs to request approval from its accreditor, the New England Commission of Higher Education.