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Oman Developing Higher Education, diversifying economy

Global Arab Network - - Hannan Taha

Friday, 25 February 2011 00:15

Her Excellency Dr Rawya Saud Al Busaidi, Minister of Higher Education in Oman gave a speech addressing the Learning & Leadership Conference in London on the experience of the Sultanate of Oman in shaping a system of Higher Education to suit the needs of a rapidly growing and diversifying economy.
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The following are extracts of Her Excellency’s speech at the Middle East Association event:

Oman’s system of Higher Education began in the mid 1980’s with a momentous royal decree – to charter Oman’ first degree-granting Higher Education Institution, Sultan Qaboos University, destined to be the nation’s premier university.

A decade later, the Ministry of Higher Education was established as a separate entity; and it was then that the growth and development of Higher Education in Oman embarked on an accelerated trajectory in both the government and private sectors, but particularly the latter.

In the early 1990’s, like other Gulf countries, the Sultanate decided, in view of rising costs and accelerated demand, to expand its system of higher education by inviting the private sector to participate. Private Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are owned, funded, and to some extent, governed, by investors from the private sector.

In the early days of the development of Oman’s new higher education system, obviously the Government’s first priority had be access for citizens who until the late 1980’s had no option but to study abroad. The burgeoning demand of a young population was met largely through the rapid development of an array of private Higher Education Institutions.

In 1995 the country had only one private college; today there are twenty-seven private Higher Education Institutions enrolling more than 34,000 students. Seven of these are private universities spanning the regions of the Sultanate.

The total number of private universities is soon to reach nine, as two additional private universities are in the planning stages, Muscat University and a new branch of the University of Toulouse.

Government HEIs have also developed and expanded. There are currently six Colleges of Applied Sciences under the Ministry of Higher Education, enrolling approximately 7,000 students; seven Colleges of Technology under the Ministry of Manpower with an enrolment of 8,600; and sixteen Institutes of Health Science enrolling over 1,000 students, along with a number of specialised HEIs in other government agencies or Ministries such as the Ministry of Defense.

The total number of students in Higher Education in Oman today is close to 82,000 students enrolled in more than sixty HEIs, two-thirds of which are government institutions. In addition, more than 12,000 Omani students are currently studying abroad.

The case of Sultan Qaboos University dramatically illustrates the phenomenal growth of Higher Education in Oman. In 1987, the University opened its doors to only a few hundred students; and, over the past quarter century, that number has increased to over 17,000 studying a full range of undergraduate and an increasing number of graduate programs in nine colleges.

However, meeting the demand for seats in Higher Education is only a first basic step in producing a skilled workforce. High quality institutions with curricula focused on student outcomes that are fit for purpose, or directly relevant to the job market, are essential. It is absolutely critical that Higher Education is aligned with the job market.

As the economy undergoes rapid growth and diversification away from reliance on petroleum, the higher education system in Oman is proving flexible and responsive by increasing the range of programs offered, both through new specialised institutions in areas such as Port Management and Tourism; and through changes and additions to the spectrum of programs offered by established colleges, including the Ministry of Higher Education’s Colleges of Applied Sciences.

While access to diversified programs is a fundamental requirement for Higher Education in the Sultanate today, meeting international standards is an overriding priority.

As is well-known, where profit is involved in Higher Education, quality can be an issue; and a number of measures have been put in place to help ensure that quality remains a priority. It is a requirement that private HEIs are affiliated with reputable international universities for the purpose of quality assurance and guidance with respect to curriculum development and other vital matters.

A total of eighteen British Higher Education institutions have undertaken academic affiliation agreements with Oman’s private HEIs. I am pleased to note that in recent years the list includes some of the more highly ranked Universities such as Reading, Leeds and Stirling.

Private Higher Education Institutions are under the supervision of the Ministry of Higher Education and are directly supported by government through land grants, tax exemptions and subsidies which take the form of payment of tuition for students from social welfare families.

Along with all government HEIs, all private universities and colleges are subject to quality audit by Oman’s Academic Accreditation Authority, established a decade ago as a major initiative to help ensure the quality of Higher Education in the Sultanate.

Private HEIs also have their own national quality network to share best practice. Clearly, Higher Education in the Sultanate is focused on continuous quality improvement.

What initiatives have we taken to ensure that our graduates have the competencies and skills needed for the job market in their chosen fields? I will give examples of initiatives from the Ministry’s Colleges of Applied Sciences.

Program Advisory Committees have been established with representation from Business and Industry as a means of gaining input from practitioners to help ensure the relevance of academic programs and to establish links and build relations with the private sector.

In addition, a full-time Private Sector Liaison position was established for the same purpose and also to assist in securing student placements. This initiative included setting up in each College, a Career Guidance Centre to help students, not only in their career choices but also with CV preparation and job interview skills.

Career Fairs, in which potential employers are brought together with graduation students looking for jobs, is another initiative that has proved tremendously successful.

We are working hard to add value to our academic programs by bringing international experts for workshops and short teaching assignments.

For instance, teachers from HRH the Prince of Wales’ School of Traditional Arts came to one of the Colleges of Applied Sciences in Oman where they gave a valuable and exciting three-day workshop on Islamic Design as the first step in establishing cooperative relations that we hope will result in more workshops, secondments and student exchange.

While we have yet to embark on projects such as teaching leadership skills across the curriculum, we have introduced a course on entrepreneurial skills at Sultan Qaboos University, as well as in all the Colleges of Applied Sciences; and, later this year, will hold an international conference in partnership with the Beijing Central University for Finance and Economics - on Entrepreneurship Education.

Since government jobs in Oman, as in many countries around the world, including the United Kingdom, are being reduced; and career-track jobs in the private sector are filling up, we are encouraging our young graduates to start their own businesses.

There are many good examples of successful entrepreneurs of both genders in Oman; and some of these will participate as role models in our Entrepreneurship Education Conference.

It is important to note that women account for more than 50% of the total enrollment in Oman’s HEIs; and that higher education is playing a vital role in the advancement and empowerment of women as they gain knowledge and skills and contribute to the nation’s economic and social development.

One of the challenges we face, and this is common to the Arab World, is that women do not participate in the workforce in numbers proportionate to that of their male counterparts – lagging behind all other regions in the world, including Africa, Asia and Latin America.

This realization, reinforced by high profile studies such as The Road not Travelled: Education Reform in the Middle East and North Africa by the World Bank, is resulting in productive recommendations and initiatives throughout the region to support and encourage the participation of women in economic development.

While, at the present time, Omani women constitute only about 19% of the workforce, it is important to note that they work in all sectors and are found at all levels.

New initiatives taken to align programs with the job market include the development and implementation of a Graduate Survey to be conducted every three years. Surveys of both graduates and their employers are a key instrument used to assess the relevance and quality of student outcomes in Higher Education.

In today’s technological world, quality is necessarily dependent on state-of-the-art information access and management systems. Accordingly, e-Services in Higher Education in Oman are a priority.

I am proud to mention that students can access our Central Admissions System not only on-line though a fully interactive electronic admissions system, but also through a responsive SMS text messaging system. This was a global first, for which the Ministry won an international award.

Earlier this month we launched a new Higher Education Statistical Database System similar to that pioneered by HESA here in the UK. In fact, through the British Council, HESA experts were instrumental in the development of both our Admissions and Statistical systems.

Aligned with the thrust for quality is the aim of increasing internationalisation in Higher Education. The growing wealth of international initiatives includes scholarships for Omani students to study abroad and collaborative academic agreements with a number of countries around the world, such as South Africa, India, Russia, Uzbekistan and Brunei.

As part of an overall international thrust, the MoHE is expanding its overseas scholarship program to include more countries; and His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said has just granted RO 100 million (164 million GDP) for 1,000 scholarships for Omani graduates to study at universities abroad.

In 2008/9 more than 9,500 Omanis were studying abroad at the undergraduate level, along with over 2,500 at the graduate level, in some 35-40 countries around the globe.

Great Britain has long been a destination favoured by Omani students; and, currently about 1,350 Omani students are studying at British Universities.

Of major significance in the Sultanate’s global initiatives are the HM Sultan Qaboos bin Said academic chairs for research, endowed at prestigious universities in Europe, the USA, Asia and the Gulf Region. As of yesterday, when we inaugurated the Sultan Qaboos Professorship of Abrahamic Faiths and Shared Values at the University of Cambridge, there are fifteen such chairs around the world.

Three of these are in Great Britain, the other two being the Sultan of Oman Fellowship in the Centre for Islamic Studies at the University of Oxford and the Sultan Qaboos bin Said Professorship of Modern Arabic Studies at the University of Cambridge.

In world standards, the strength of any system of Higher Education is judged by its research activities. In recognition of the importance of research, His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said established The Research Council with a mandate to promote and guide Research & Development activities throughout the nation; and this has been a great boon to Higher Education.

In part encouraged by the establishment of The Research Council, Sultan Qaboos University in particular has made great strides in capacity-building and expansion of research.

The University has created a Deputy Vice-Chancellorship for Post Graduate Studies and Research, as well as a Deanship for Research, and has expanded its PhD offerings. In collaboration with The Research Council, new research chairs are being established at Sultan Qaboos University, the first of which is for Nanotechnology for Water Desalination.

All of Oman's private universities have made research a priority and are working collaboratively with The Research Council. The Strategic Plan for the Colleges of Applied Sciences includes an emphasis on applied research; and I was very pleased to see that the IT program in these colleges has been funded for two research projects through which a small number of students will learn hands-on research skills. This is of course only the beginning.

To conclude, in just four short decades, the Sultanate has built a comprehensive, inclusive, and future-ready system of Higher Education that is providing the skills and leadership required for the nation as it plays its part in a global world.

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Global Arab Network

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Last Updated on Saturday, 05 March 2011 12:54

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