The decades since the 1960s and 1970s have witnessed massive growth of education systems and widening access to education, also in developing countries. Many developing countries have built modern human capital development systems from scratch just in a few decades. However, schooling does not necessarily equal learning. In several developing countries assessments reveal that half or more of the children completing primary schooling are unable to read the simplest texts or perform elementary arithmetic tasks. (Pritchett 2013.) Years of schooling does not guarantee high literacy and numeracy skills in developed countries either: in some “high skills countries” the average performance in literacy and mathematics has been deteriorating and the share of low performers has been increasing (e.g. PISA 2012).

One example of countries with almost 100 % enrolment rates in the ten year basic schooling coupled with very poor learning outcomes in literacy, science and mathematics the Sultanate of Oman. Since the late 1960s there has been a rapid evolution from a very poor to a very rich country, e.g., with a quadrupling of gross enrolment and literacy rates and a 27-year increase in life expectancy. (United Nations 2010.) In spite of years spent in school less than half of Omani fourth graders achieve the international benchmark “low” in mathematics assessed in TIMSS in 2011. The international average is 90 %. Only five percent of Omani pupils reach the level “high ” (cf, in Hong Kong and Singapore about 80 % of pupils reach the level “high”). The results and international ranking of Omani pupils in literacy (PIRLS 2011) are quite the same as in mathematics. The difference between boys and girls in learning outcomes is one of the widest when compared internationally, girls performing significantly better than boys.

The Education Council of Oman identifies several challenges the education sector as a whole is facing now and in the near future. According to the Council one of the central challenges is “the need for improving the quality of the outcomes of the education system.” The future road map of improvement of the school system is targeted at:

• ensuring the integration and comprehensiveness of the education system,
• improving learning outcomes in a way that matches international levels and making students acquire basic skills required by higher education institutions and the labour market,
• improving the performance of teaching staff and the efficiency of administrative and supervision cadres,
• achieving good level of communication and cooperation with parents and other concerned parties,
• moving away from focusing on inputs towards focusing on outputs.

Ministry of Education has launched a national project to raise the standard of teacher professional development to improve quality of the education system and therefore established the Specialized Centre for Professional Training of Teachers which “is concerned with raising capabilities of teachers, polishing their skills, measuring their performance and finding mechanisms and plans for their training and analysing their performance.” (Education Council ... 2012, 41.)

This presentation is based on a research that aims at studying (1) the challenges of effective teaching in Omani schools, (2) how these challenges are addressed by measures taken for developing teachers’ professional competences, and (3) the impact and effectiveness of national teacher professional development activities.

The main focus is on the third research aim. The aim is twofold: firstly, this research is interested in the changes taking place in teachers’ knowledge, skills and attitudes, and secondly, focus is also on the effects the trained teachers have on teaching and learning methods used at their own school, and, more generally, effects they have on school community at large. (cf. Guskey1985, 2002, 2003; Saunders 2013, 2014.)

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