29,732 seats for higher education students

MUSCAT, MARCH 26 - The Ministry of Higher Education, represented by the Admission Centre (HEAC), will open the electronic admission system for students to register for the General Education Diploma (GED) and its equivalent for the academic year 2019-2020 from April 1 to June 1. The total number of seats available for this year is 29,732. Giving the details at a press conference on Tuesday, Dr Abdullah bin Mohammed al Sarmi, Under-Secretary of the Ministry of Higher Education, said the number of study programmes in government higher education institutions, scholarships and grants for the academic year 2019-2020 stands at 415, distributed according to the following fields of study: 10 programmes in agriculture and environment, 20 in nature and physical sciences, 67 in engineering and technology, 71 in health, 19 in innovative arts, 47 in society and culture, 48 in education, 34 in information technology, 63 in administration, 18 in architecture and 4 in religion and philosophy. Eight programmes are yet to be identified. Omani students aged between 16 and 25 can register in the HEAC system and apply for the programmes offered at government higher education institutions, internal scholarships in private higher education institutions, and external scholarships abroad. The second screening is limited to students who do not get opportunity in the first screening. This is to increase the chances of students who are not accepted in the first screening to get seats at the beginning of the academic year and to complete admission formalities by the beginning of September. The results of experimental screening will be announced at the beginning of July each year, in view of the success of this procedure developed last year. This procedure aims to educate students on the programmes they are expected to be accepted. Students who are not expected to get any seats are also contacted and advised to add more study programmes in the system. Some new updates are added to the system and programmes this year. He said that IELTS might be required for some programmes within the student’s guide due to requirements and conditions of admission to foreign universities, such as educational specialties and some health specialties, as well as in some disciplines offered in Canada. With regard to external scholarships, after resolving certain issues faced by students in Malaysia relating to administrative, educational issues or immigration, some seats there have been relaunched for the academic year. The scholarship for Malaysia was suspended in the academic year 2018-2019. The scholarship for ‘Omani experts’ programme will be suspended from the academic year 2019-2020. However, this year there will be several seats for the ‘law’ specialisation in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. With regard to internal scholarships, new programmes have been added, which includes the Diploma in Geometry and Geometrics at the Institute of Topographic Sciences. This is in addition to veterinary medicine — University of Al Sharqiyah, urban and regional planning and management and environmental practice at the International College of Engineering and Technology.