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Speech of His Excellency Abdullah bin Khamis Ambosaidi, undersecretary of the Ministry of Education for Education

Education sector is being accorded great attention by His Majesty Sultan Haitham Bin Tarik, notably under the current exceptional conditions.  His Majesty the Sultan gave directives to make School Year 2020/2021 as a year of Hybrid Learning. Therefore, the ministry is working to create sustainable hybrid education, certainly many challenges will emerge because hybrid education is a new system at the national level despite the presence of some technical initiatives.

The ministry’s efforts are great in preparing for hybrid education, and the questionnaire presented by the ministry shows effective partnership between the ministry and society. In addition, the ministry is seeking to translate the priorities of vision Oman 2040 by introducing hybrid education and it has implemented the complementary curriculum, which is a curriculum that focuses on providing students with the necessary skills and knowledge that they had missed due to the impact of COVID-19.

A set of health procedures termed “Health Protocol” is introduced among the salient features of the Sultanate’s education system. The Health Protocol features the roles of all segments pertaining to the school community, including students, teachers and parents, who are all exhorted to undertake precautions like maintaining social distancing, wearing face masks, washing hands, using sanitizers and operating school buses at half capacity.

Another feature of the Sultanate’s educational system this year is the School Operation Program, which endorses the system of hours rather than the system of classes. Schools have been put in three categories, depending on density as follows: Low density schools that operate with not more than 16 students per class in a day at a rate of 3 hours per ‘school day’. Medium density schools that operate at a rate of 4 hours a day at half capacity (number of students) during the first week and the other half during the week that follows. High density schools operate at a rate of 5 hours a day at one-third capacity in every week. Students have to be put in three sets (to attend in three weeks), except 12th Class students, who will be put in two sets, with the first group attending in the first week and the second in the week that follows.

The Ministry is concerned to be fair while evaluating, so students will be test only in the information that they will acquire in the classroom, and the Ministry is keen to maintain the actual learning time, which is 180 school days and does not prejudice that, specifying the knowledge and skills that the student must acquire.

Therefore, we thank government entities and private sector who have supported the learning platforms, and we invite other institutions and companies to provide support that helps facilitate the learning process. For its part, the Ministry will provide students with a number of learning platforms divided according to seminars and these platforms provide a number of interactive activities and visual presentations. The Ministry also provides a platform for an integrated e-library and another platform for class preparation, and it seeks, through telecom in Oman, to strengthen the network in schools, cover schools with ] Internet, and provide the necessary support for insolvent families in cooperation with other government entities.

We encourage the people of Oman to provide the support that they can for our students as a matter of community partnership. Adding that  the morning and evening schools will remain as they are, and we will not burden parents with more responsibly, and we will provide them with a parent manual which explain how they can help their kids in e-learning. We would like also to thank teachers for their cooperation with the ministry and registration of a set of classes for educational platforms, and broadcast a live class program on TV of the Sultanate of Oman. Also,we have developed a teacher-training plan that starts on 9/27/2020 and last for a period of two weeks. after the school year for some schools begins before the specified date an exception from the ministry is for these schools because of their association with education in their countries, such as community schools, and for their application of international programs such as international schools. Adding, the academic year for some schools will start before the specified date, with the exception of the ministry for these schools because of their relevance to education in their countries, such as international schools.