Oman's national educational program expanded rapidly during the 1970s and the 1980s, with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia sending teachers on its own expense during that time period.
Attendance usually extends from 8:00 a.m. to 12:30 pm, the teacher being free to organise this period as they deem appropriate between school learning and artistic and leisure activities.
The Ministry of Education is in the process of finalising the advanced curriculum for the kindergarten level, based on self-learning as a method and centered on the Omani child and on his/her environment, cultural heritage and civilisation.
The aim of the reform is to create a unified system covering the first ten years of schooling.
Oman retains a number of grammar schools of international renown and a majority of which are private educational establishments offering Classics beyond Latin and Greek to include the ancient literary studies of Sanskrit, Hebrew and Arabic.
Prior to the establishment of SQU, the government sent some students to pursue higher education studies in neighbouring Arab countries like UAE, Kuwait, Jordan and Egypt.
The colleges of Arts and Social Sciences, Commerce and Economics, Education, Law, and Nursing offer bachelor's and some master's degrees.
62/2007 was issued to transform them to better cater to the current labour market in fields such as international business administration, communication, design, engineering, and IT.
Since private colleges were very limited in the mid nineties, more and more students sought higher education in countries like the UAE, Jordan and Egypt.
The government became aware of the trend and decided to encourage the private sector in Oman to form universities and colleges.
In the year 2003, Oman's Ministry of Higher Education approved the merger of five private run colleges to form the Muscat University.
Each higher education institute publishes the minimum entry requirement for each of its degrees and the student selects his or her choices in order of preference.