In the colonial time, Italian Somaliland and British Somaliland pursued different educational policies. The Italians sought to train pupils to become farmers or unskilled workers so as to minimize the number of Italians needed for these purposes. The British accomplished an elementary education system during the military administration to train Somali males for administrative posts and for positions not previously open to them. They set up a training school for the police and one for medical orderlies.

In 1990 several other institutes also admitted secondaryschool graduates. Among these were schools of nursing, telecommunications, and veterinary science, and a polytechnic institute. The numbers listed and the duration of the courses were not known. In addition, several programs were directed at adults. The government had claimed 60% literacy after the mass literacy campaign of the mid-1970s, but by early 1977 there were signs of relapse, particularly among nomads. The government then accomplished the National Adult Education Center to coordinate the work of several ministries and many voluntary and part-time paid workers in an considerable literacy program, largely in rural areas for persons 16 to 45 years of age. contempt these efforts, the UN estimate of Somali literacy in 1990 was only 24%.

Before Somalia’s government collapsed in 1991 and fighting escalated among clans seeking control of the nation, education was free and compulsory for children between the ages of 6 and 14. The literacy rate increased from 5% of the adult population in the early 1970s to 24 % in 1990 following an intensive government-sponsored literacy campaign. As a result of Somalia’s civil war, the educational system collapsed and most schools closed, including the Somali National University in Mogadishu, which had an enrollment of about 4,600 prior to the war. In 1996 primary schools listed only 8% of school-aged children, and general secondary schools listed a mere 5%.