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08-09-2019

Oman Observer

Muscat, Every year on September 8, the Sultanate of Oman joins the world in celebrating the International Literacy Day. This participation comes in response to the decision of the General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, issued in 1966, stipulating September 8 as International Literacy Day.

On this day, the whole world commemorates a day of solidarity with people and groups to eradicate illiteracy. It aims to reinforce the efforts in fighting it and to realise one of the basic human rights, the right to education. This realisation is through plans and strategies specialised in educating adult learners, and focusing on providing educational opportunities for senior citizens.

To achieve the desired goal, the Sultanate has made great efforts eradicating illiteracy.

The Sultanate has committed to implement the terms and recommendations of the Arab Decade for Literacy (2015/2024). The Ministry of Education has focused on the productive age group 15-44 during this period through developing appropriate plans and strategies, and strengthening partnerships between the official institutions and the private sector and civil society institutions to achieve it, according to the statistics.

The percentage of illiteracy in this age group is 1.85 per cent by the end of 2018, compared to the percentage of the same category in 2015, the beginning of the Arab decade, where the percentage was 2.2 per cent. This is a qualitative achievement in the elimination of illiteracy in the Sultanate in seeking to achieve its commitment by 2024.

One of the pioneering projects that the Ministry of Education had implemented is the ‘Learning Village’ project, which was and is still opening and spreading across the various governorates of the Sultanate. The project has the greatest impact in accelerating the eradication of illiteracy; by the end of 2018, the people in 30 villages were educated.

The ‘Cooperating School’ project has provided significant support from public schools throughout the Sultanate, including the opening of literacy classes within the school or providing assistance outside, through taking advantage of the potentials and services provided in this area. By the end of 2018, the number of cooperating schools reached 96.

The project ‘Literacy of Omanis in the Islands and Marine Villages’ is among the new projects that have played a role in ushering illiterates to the world of letters and numbers in Al Halaniyat in Dhofar, Masirah in South Al Sharqiyah, and Lima and Kamzar in Musandam. The approved study in this project is 3 years. The project began in the academic year 2017/2018 and the number of students in the project reached about 75 students.

The project ‘Literacy of Illiterate Workers in the Private Sector’ is one of the projects based on cooperation between the Ministry of Education and the private sector in the field of literacy.

It began in the academic year 2018/2019 and the duration of study in this project should be one academic year with intense study plan to teach Arabic, Islamic and mathematics.

In addition, a project entitled ‘Literacy for People with Disabilities’ was launched in the academic year 2018/2019 to educate the illiterate disabled citizens and residents across the Sultanate. The project comes in cooperation with the other ministries and concerned authorities.

The Ministry of Education calls on illiterate citizens to learn to read and write as it is a common national responsibility, and to contribute effectively to social and economic development of the nation and for their own welfare.