| The education system in Oman underwent tremendous development during the past four decades, however, the national economy dependency on oil threatens the sustainability of its education funding. This study aims to explore the relationship between education funding and oil price fluctuations in Qatar, U.A.E., and Oman from 1975 to 2015. Moreover, it aims to suggest new economic alternatives to diversify the education funding sources in Oman. This quantitative study, under the framework of Human Capital Theory, utilized descriptive and associational approaches to study the association between oil prices and education expenditures in the three countries. Multiple regression analyses showed that oil prices significantly predicted the government expenditure on education in Oman and Qatar with (beta = --0.40, p = 0.013) and (beta = 2.47, p = 0.02) respectively, while it was not significant in predicting the government expenditure on education (beta = 0.36, p = 0.40) in the U.A.E. This study highlighted how Qatar and U.A.E were successful in moving away from oil dependency. The researcher recommended that the Omani government must encourage the inflow of direct foreign investment into its education field, like establishment of new education hubs, educational cities, and opening new branches for some of the leading educational institutions from around the world. The researcher plans to conduct future qualitative research to enrich knowledge in this area. |
