IOS creates conducive platform to bring home Oromo studies by foreigners and Diaspora to document and preserve as references for further studies. It coordinates fragmented research on Oromo scholarships both from inland and abroad to create strong research institutes in Oromia. It supports the Growth and Transformation Plan of FDRE creating venue for academic and intellectual inquiry to bring palpable cultural, political, social and economic changes in Oromia in interdisciplinary studies. Likewise, it brings together intellectuals from multidisciplinary fields (health, agriculture, technology, natural sciences, business, education, law and other social sciences) having their respective boxes. To this effect, the Institute:
1. Provides clearly articulated and transparent guidelines to Oromo studies and ensure academic programmes and research on Oromo to be done collaboratively to:
•Network researchers, academics and students locally and internationally in a multidisciplinary ways to explore new frontiers in research on Oromo culture, language, wisdom and indigenous knowledge systems.
•collaborate with domestic and international researchers on Oromo studies in different disciplines to benefit Oromia Regional State.
•sponsor and coordinate lectures and conferences at Jimma University and Oromia Regional State level by distinguished academic and governmental and business leaders whose works contribute to a better understanding of the Oromo culture, language, music, art and wisdom and the challenges facing them.
•bring knowledge from Oromo traditional practices and folk wisdom to Jimma University by supporting elderly people, academics and students with grants for research.
•bring together a multidisciplinary group of scholars and practitioners to explore new frontiers in research on Oromo culture, language, wisdom and traditional and indigenous knowledge systems.
•support research on indigenous Oromo social, political and economic structures and contribute to modern economic development, social progress, and political democracy.
2. Provide a Community, Regional State and International Community a single Point of Contact
• provides a transparent and accessible interface among education and research on Oromo affairs.
•offers the local community and the Regional State consultancies and professional development and skills training services related to Oromo language, folklore, literature, culture, arts and knowledge-based economy.
•Offers international community a window to the University research, consultancy and professional development purposes on Oromo issues.
•Offers external constituencies a single point of contact to initiate inquiries about Jimma University’s Oromo studies and capabilities and be a spring board from where referral can be made to appropriate responders.
•Establishes a centre that catalogues publications, audiovisual recordings, periodicals, journals and other publications on Oromo studies.
•Organizes and document the fragmented intellectual productions already at home and abroad by making the center a powerhouse for information on intellectual and cultural expressions while always taking initiatives to promote Oromo studies both nationally and internationally.
3. Meet Workforce Development Needs
•Improves undergraduate education (including Bachelor programs currently in place) by promoting new interdisciplinary courses to strengthen Oromo studies.
•Develops customized, tailor-made short term trainings to build the capacity of the region in Oromo language, arts, culture and folklore.
•Fosters the development of a scientific and rigorous original research on Afan Oromo, folklore and literature, and cultural studies.
•Provides rapid-response by training workforces based on demand and need of the region.
•Works to intellectualize and standardize Afan Oromo for use in science and technology, latest mass media technology and by enhancing its capacity for literature and research.
•Enables collaborative grant writing in arts, humanities, social sciences and other fields to develop researches on Oromo people and Oromo cultures.
• Develops and implement Afan Oromo dictionary making.
• Spear heads researches on Oromo studies.
4. Promote and Support Innovative Research and Training Opportunities
•Serves as an umbrella Oromo research institute in guiding, developing and promoting serious scholarship on the history, economy, culture, health, education, politics, indigenous knowledge and welfare of the Oromo.
•works towards achieving the University’s goal of making teaching research-based and more scientific.
•Promotes the quality of scientific thinking, academic cultures and debates, intellectual life among the Oromo people.
• Fosters mutual understanding among the Oromo people and other peoples in Ethiopia.
•Provides the opportunity and mechanism for non-Oromo scholars to participate in the evolution and development of scholarship of Oromo people.
• Initiates collaborative projects to conduct research on felt need of the Oromo people and other people in Ethiopia.
•Brings together the necessary skills and knowledge to coordinate resources to facilitate research that can respond in a timely manner to national and regional training needs.
•Seeks partnerships with regional states and nongovernmental and individuals to conduct innovative researches and publish books, dictionaries, thesaurus, and gloss and dialect map of Oromia.
•Prepares collaborative grant proposal to conduct research on Oromo corpora and develop software for Oromo language.
•Sponsors and conducts annual international research conferences and publish multidisciplinary journals, proceedings and policy briefs on Oromia related issues to support national development endeavor.
5. Promote and Support Innovative Creative Fine Arts and Performances
•Develops Oromo soft wares through natural language processing in collaborative and joint funding system.
• Supports creative writing and develops Oromo music and arts, film, paint and so on.
•Provides a forum for Oromo scholars and others who are interested in Oromo issues both abroad and in the country to cooperate and support each other in developing research and writing skills, and in identifying and soliciting resources for such activities.
•Records in documentary and ethnographic films Oromo traditional gadaa system, buttaa, irreecha, hammachisa, waaqefannaa, ateetee, marriage ceremonies and other rituals and festivals that are practiced in different zones. It also records historical sites, heritages and religious practices together with other political, cultural and social events in Oromo life for further studies.
6. Support and create opportunities for publications of Oromo studies
•Seeks support and coordinates assistance on Oromo studies from government sources and non-governmental agencies.
• Establishes audiovisual and audio recording center.
- Establish printing press for publishing different works on Oromo easily and timely.
• Publishes interdisciplinary journal to promote Oromo studies
• Records Oromo creative works and performance studies in CD and DVD for studies and criticism.
•Creates conducive environment for Oromo writers to publish their creative and professional writings in a book form
• Publishes different newspapers, magazines and books in Afaan Oromo.
7. Provides Outreach Services to the Regional State
• Ensures that communities, the state, non-governmental organizations, agencies, environmental groups and investors have access to outreach activities such as technical advice, advocacy, seminars, workshops and organizational assistance that encourage and promote sustainable and responsible development.
•Helps in creating conducive environment to generate funds for researches on Oromo studies by strengthening the capacity of the departments in line with the thematic areas of the University.
•Enhances the philosophy of Jimma University, “We are in the Community” especially from cultural point of view in the community outreach program.