News & Event

The Ministry of Education celebrated today (Wednesday) morning the launch of the OMEFCO School Innovation Award in its first session for the academic year 2023/2024 under the patronage of HE Prof. Dr. Abdullah bin Khamis Ambosaidi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Education for Education. This award comes in cooperation with the Omani Indian Fertilizer Company (OMIFCO).

The ceremony included a speech delivered by HE Dr. Abdullah bin Khamis Ambosaidi, the Undersecretary of the Ministry for Education, in which he said: “We are pleased to launch the OMIFCO Award for School Creativity Award which comes in partnership with the Omani Indian Fertilizer Company (OMIFCO). We expect that this award will stimulate creativity and quality of education in our schools. The award is an extension of the company’s award in the South Al Sharqiyah Governorate, and the Ministry and the company decided to spread the competition throughout the Sultanate of Oman. The fields of the competition were divided into four categories, and each one has sub-fields, or sub-criteria. The award targets educational institutions in general, and therefore the standards are linked to institutional work, and we hope that schools will take the initiative to participate and present their productions. The main committees and subcommittees will be in the educational directorates as an integral part of selecting the best schools.”

After the speech, the logo of competition was revealed, then Nasser Al-Siyabi, Head of the Competitions and Awards Department, gave a presentation of the award guide in which he mentioned the award’s vision and mission, then touched on its values such as: quality, effectiveness, partnership, and achievement. He pointed out in the presentation the most important goals of the award which include strengthening the educational system to achieve the goals of school education in Oman Vision 2040, stimulating school administrative organization skills among those working in the educational field, and raising the level of students’ academic achievement by enhancing the quality of school performance. The ceremony concluded with a presentation of the award’s evaluation application presented by Sheikha Al-Azri, Information Systems Specialist, which included how to access the

application, how to attach files, view the guide, the mechanism for evaluating schools, and nominating them for the award.

The award includes four areas: the field of administrative organization, which includes school councils and committees, security, safety, regularity, and discipline; the field of strategic planning such as: effectiveness of leadership, the school plan, and related plans; the field of community partnership such as the parents’ council, and communication with local community institutions; and the field of performance quality, which includes developing the performance of administrative, teaching, and technical staff, and academic achievement.

The award prizes were divided into two levels, the first level at the governorate level, where first place receives (2,000) Omani riyals, second place receives (1,500) Omani riyals, and third place receives (1,000) Omani riyals. The second level is at the level of the Sultanate of Oman, where first place receives (5,000) Omani riyals, the second place receives (4,000) Omani riyals, and the third place receives (3,000) Omani riyals. There are also incentive prizes for three places worth (1,000) Omani riyals, and a number of creativity shields are allocated at the level of the Sultanate of Oman for each field of the competition with a value of (8000) Omani riyals, for each field (2000) Omani riyals.

It is worth noting that the OMIFCO School Innovation Award is given every two academic years to honor government schools with high performance in carrying out their main tasks in the field of strategic planning, administrative organization, quality of performance, and community partnership, achieving distinguished performance indicators to reach the set goals through developing plans formulated with high precision and benefit from valid data. The award seeks to motivate schools to innovate by achieving the highest levels of integrated planning, quality performance, and distinguished administrative organization with effective community partnership. There is a set of detailed standards that fall within these areas, and measure with high precision administrative and technical practices through specific indicators that will raise school performance levels.