International Standard ISCED 2011 to be implemented this year

Habib Al-Lawati: "We are looking forward to enhancing statistical capabilities in the Sultanate"

Muscat  20 March 2014

A collaborative four day workshop organized by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI) in cooperation with Omani National Commission for Education, Culture and Science and the UNESCO office in Doha was concluded yesterday. The workshop, titled "The International Standard Classification of Statistics for Education and Culture - ISCED 2011" was attended by statistical specialists representing the relevant authorities in the government sector. The first two days of the workshop were devoted to the training and rating of ISCED 2011 and education financing statistics, while the third and fourth day were devoted for training on culture statistics.

During the workshop, participants were trained on how to overcome the differences in national educational programs in different countries. The ISCED 2011 Standard provides a uniform classification system for the collection and reporting of statistics from the Education and Culture sectors, allowing data to be readily compared at an international level.

Regarding culture statistics, the workshop participants were trained on the general framework of cultural statistics and how to measure the economic and social impact. The workshop also highlighted the ways of implementing cultural statistics and related information sources, and mentioned how the cultural statistics determine productive activities, commodities, services, trade and cultural professions globally.

Commenting on the conclusion of the ISCED 2011 workshop, Habib Bin Jaafar acting General Manager for Social Statistics at NCSI noted; "the success of this workshop and the great benefit earned by the participants encourages us to conduct similar workshops in the future to enhance the abilities of the statisticians".

Yousef Falah Ismail, Consultant at the UNISCO office in Doha emphasized on the importance of such workshops, adding; " Such workshops help statisticians in their work, in order to provide a higher level of quality and greater clarity when comparing statistics with other countries, and we're pleased that the ISCED 2011 standard will be implemented in the Sultanate this year, as it is an upgraded system of ISCED 1997".

Stressing the significance of the workshop, Dr. Humaid Al Nofali - International Relations Specialist at the Omani National Commission for Education, Culture and Science - said: "This workshop is very important as the Sultanate prepares data reports and statistics on issues related to culture and education to share them with international organizations who utilize the data to formulate future developmental plans and strategies. We assure proper communication and flow of data, and we highlight the Omani efforts in this field which resulted in such a great workshop. Three seminars had been conducted and this is the fourth one. The Sultanate is putting emphasis in education and uses educational statistics and data to lay down future developmental plans and strategies."

"This workshop as a rich content and it is covering various important topics. Participants learned the proper way of organizing data required by the international organizations, and they are capable of providing the data in the required manner. This workshop has been a success, and I would like to take this opportunity to express my thanks and gratitude to all the parties who made the workshop possible," he added.

Halimah Al Wahaibi, Demography Specialist at NCSI, who participated in the workshop, said: "This training helped me understand how educational research and data collection is conducted and how educational statistics are represented with international standards. This allows us to follow the international standards and to be able to provide unified data and statistics regardless of different education systems in different countries."

The ISCED standard is considered as the leading international economic and social classification by the United Nations and is applied in various education statistics on a global level. The program aims at collecting, classifying and analyzing data comparable between countries. The ISCED standard is a reference to organising educational programs, and related qualifications according to education levels and fields. It is a result of an international agreement between the member states of UNESCO.

The ISCED Standard serves as a framework for the classification of educational activities as defined in the programs as well as qualifications gained in the categories agreed internationally. The workshop conducted by NCSI enabled statisticians who are part of education organizations to apply the program methodology and convert the national education statistics. The statistics are then collated on a national level into a unified comparable data set, allowing the international comparison of education outcomes.

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© Press Release 2014