Located in southern Germany, the NATO School Oberammergau (NSO) is NATO's premier facility for training and education at the operational level. The NSO conducts hundreds of multinational programmes annually in direct support of current and developing operations, strategy, policy, doctrine and procedures. The student population is diverse, military and civilian, representing NATO nations, partner nations and international organizations – all coming together in a conducive learning environment to create the shared understanding and interoperability that is at the core of successful multinational operations. Since its founding, the NSO has graduated over 200,000 students; today, the NSO welcomes 10,000 students and conferees annually. To support the needs of the Alliance, the NSO’s curriculum has grown to more than 115 different courses today. The NSO provides courses in six main disciplines: Intelligence, Cooperative Security, Joint Operations, Joint Plans, Protection, and Non-Commissioned Officer Programmes. The course directors, drawn from over 20 nations, have a vast résumé of experience and education. They work closely with the NATO Command Structure to ensure training is relevant and timely, and they work closely with Allied Command Transformation to ensure training is developed and delivered in accordance with NATO’s training doctrine and standards. While the majority of students attend in Residence Courses, the NSO also has the capability to bring training to the customer through Mobile Education and Training Teams (METTs) and Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL). These methodologies provide the customer with greater flexibility regarding the time and place of learning, and can be more cost effective solutions. For more than 65 years, the NSO has been a place for training and education in support of the Alliance and its partners.
