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Educational disciplines and
employment opportunities seminar concludes
MUSCAT — The educational disciplines and employment opportunities
seminar, organised by the Higher Education Ministry in collaboration with a
number of government establishments, concluded at Al Bustan Palace Hotel
here yesterday. Seven official institutions participated in the two-day
seminar, namely the Education Ministry, the Civil Service Ministry, Manpower
Ministry, the Sultan Qaboos University, the Majlis Addawla and the Majlis
Ash’shura.
The seminar was aimed at raising public awareness about the limited
employment opportunities for people who take educational disciplines. The
seminar gave insights into available employment and training opportunities
for those who have already obtained educational qualifications. It also
highlighted the efforts undertaken by the government to guide students
towards disciplines needed in the labour market.
Second Day’s Deliberations
Deliberations in the second day of the seminar covered two working sessions.
The first session was chaired by Dr Muna bint Salim al Jardania, Education
Ministry Under-Secretary for Education and Curricula, while Said bin Ahmed
al Rubay’ee, Director-General of Applied Sciences Colleges at the Higher
Education Ministry, was rapourture of the session.
Majlis Ash’shura paper
Majlis Ash’shura presented a working paper by Dr Fouad bin Jaafar Sajwani,
Member of Majlis Ash’shura, who spoke about the realities of the situation
and the proposed solutions. His paper covered mechanisms used to raise
public awareness of the little need for educational specialties in the
labour market and the efforts undertaken by the government in this respect.
The paper highlighted the visions of the Majlis, particularly the importance
of utilising the qualifications of the existing educational diploma holders
to find other job opportunities in other professions, particularly in
private sector institutions. The working paper outlined the reasons
behind Omani youths being interested in government jobs.
One of the reasons, the paper found, was a common belief among citizens
that government jobs provide the employees to have their share of the
national wealth. Favourable working conditions, flexible working
hours, the number of weekly off days, the length of annual vacations,
training and development opportunities, career promotion, social perceptions
and authority are among the reasons found by the paper to be behind
preference to government jobs.
Manpower Ministry paper
The Manpower Ministry presented a working paper titled “Current and future
needs of the labour market in the private sector.” The paper was presented
by Hamad bin Khamis al Aamri, Under-Secretary of Manpower Ministry for
Technical Education and Vocational Training. The paper dealt with the
need for manpower and qualifications.
It referred to the European experience, which showed that the distribution
of manpower is closely linked with the needs of the labour market. While
university graduates constitute 17 per cent of the total manpower, 63 per
cent are technicians and skilled and 20 per cent are limited skilled
labour, it was observed.
The paper stressed that the labour market needs for manpower are not limited
to university graduates. It showed that there is a pressing need for
technical disciplines that require educational standards below university
study. Al Aamri pointed out that, while it is possible to control
education and training policies to link their outputs (qualification
holders) to the labour market needs, still it is difficult for policy makers
to control the labour market developments, which are governed by other
important internal and external factors.
This situation makes it necessary for the education and training
institutions to develop their training programmes to keep pace with the
abour market requirements. Al Aamri called for the drafting of
guidelines to help educational institutions to monitor the labour market and
tailor their training needs accordingly and, also, to make education
career-based and quality-oriented. This, he said, should serve as a platform
for encouraging entrepreneurship and ‘free business culture’.
Civil Service Ministry paper
The second session — run Dr Abdullah bin Mohammed al Sarmi, Higher Education
Ministry Under-Secretary, and Dr Mahmoud bin Mubarak al Sulaimi, Director
General of Scholarships at the Higher Education Ministry as rapporteur of
the session — discussed papers by the Ministry of Civil Service and the
Sultan Qaboos University.
Shaikh Abdulrahman bin Ibrahim al Abri, Under-Secretary of the Civil Service
Ministry, spoke about employment and Omanisation at Civil Service
departments. It showed that meeting the needs of government and private
sectors is linked to developing human resources, as well as the drafting of
relevant plans to provide those who select educational disciplines with
relevant ‘scientific’ qualifications.
Following the implementation of the Centralised Recruitment System at the
Civil Service departments by the Civil Service Ministry — was approved by
the Council of Ministers in the second half of 1997 — and due to the
increasing number of job seekers, the study was aimed at identifying the
volume of current manpower numbers in civil service departments and trends
of absorbing national manpower in the sector during the forthcoming years.
The study also stresses the need to examine the policies governing placement
and Omanisation, as well as selection and employment procedures so that
authorities concerned with educational training establishments and planning
in the Sultanate would consider realistic needs for different disciplines.
The working paper covered a number of topics: the first dealt with the “the
current manpower in the civil service sector”.
It covered preparation of the civil service staff and working women’s status
and the total number of non-Omani employees in civil service departments.
The second topic studied the Omanisation strategy pursued by the Sultanate.
It showed that the Civil Service Ministry, since the early 90s, has
implemented precise policies for Omanising jobs held by expatriates in civil
service departments. As a result, Omanisation plans were drawn out and
large numbers of citizens were employed in posts held by expatriates. As per
statistics, the Omanisation ratio rose from 64.4 per cent in 1990 to 88.2
per cent by the end of 2008.
The majority of jobs being held by expats are in the fields of medicine,
public health and associated jobs, in addition to educational service jobs
that require more time. The Omanisation drive received a strong boost
upon the implementation of a special budget called ‘Placement Budget’ which
caters to Omani citizens being appointed to work side by side with expats to
gain experience, the paper stated.
Sultan Qaboos University paper
A second working paper was presented by the Sultan Qaboos University under
the theme “Preparation of teacher in accordance with qualification and
quality assurance standards”. The paper was presented by Dr Abdullah
bin Khamis Ambousaidi, Associate Professor and Head of the Curricula
Teaching Methods Department at the College of Education, SQU.
The paper reaffirmed that the education is main pillar of the comprehensive
development in general and human resources development in particular.
It said that the importance of education is not only restricted to
sustainable human resources development, but to improving job quality and
enhancing productivity. At the conclusion of the seminar, Shaikh Dr Khalid
bin Mohammed bin Zahir al Hinaie, Head of the Education Minister’s Office,
gave a speech summarising a number of topics being discussed during the
two-day seminar. — ONA
The seminar was aimed at raising public awareness about the limited
employment opportunities for people who take educational disciplines. The
seminar gave insights into available employment and training opportunities
for those who have already obtained educational qualifications. It also
highlighted the efforts undertaken by the government to guide students
towards disciplines needed in the labour market |
