The scholarship program targeting educators "Istehdaf":
According to the instructions of the Ministry of Education towards developing its employees of educational jobs in order to achieve its strategic objectives of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030, and due to the importance of raising the numbers of distinguished professional competencies in the education sector, the General Administration of Scholarships and Grants has developed external scholarship programs, where it launched the scholarship program for teachers, “Istehdaf”, which targets those who have educational jobs and encourages them to complete the master’s stage in the best international universities according to specific disciplines that meet the ministry’s future needs.
The targeted scholarship program "Istehdaf" is based on the strategic objectives of the Ministry of Education, the human capacity development program, and the professional standards and paths for teachers. The program also focuses on the Twelfth goal of the human capacity development program: “teachers and school principals with knowledge, skills, positive attitudes and incentives to provide high-quality education.” It focuses as well on the Thirteenth goal "Developing an effective professional system during service". In addition to the professional standards for teachers, which is concerned with professional knowledge that relates to knowledge of the content of the specialty and methods of teaching it.
In its new version, the program is targeting new specializations and a larger segment of educators, as Five main tracks have been developed in the program, namely leadership, pure sciences, special education, early childhood, and school counselling. Expanding the circle of target groups to include school deputies, student counsellors, school leaders, and educational supervisors to join the program to study precise specializations in educational administration and politics, quantitative methods in education, mathematics, science, physics, chemistry, biology, computer, English, gifted education, teaching people with special educational needs and disabilities, autism, early childhood, and school counselling.