Challenges and opportunities of adopting online learning at the University of Gondar: Lecturers’ and higher officials’ perspectives

Abstract

E-learning is the use of the internet and ICT to access learning material, interact with the content, instructor, and learners, and acquire knowledge. Education has grown rapidly and transformed the present isolated, teacher-center face-to-face education into online. Despite the impact of e-Learning, there are many challenges in adopting and implementing it in higher education. Therefore, the main purpose of the study was to investigate the perspective of lectures, challenges, and opportunities of adopting online learning. The study conducted institutional-based mixed quantitative and qualitative study designs at the University of Gondar from June to October 2022. Simple random sampling techniques were employed to select study participants for the quantitative study and purposive sampling was used to select higher officials for an in-depth interview. A structured self-administered and in-depth interview guide questionnaire was used for the quantitative and qualitative data respectfully. Linear regression analysis conducted for the quantitative data while inductive thematic analysis was undertaken for the qualitative data. Thirteen (13) higher officials were involved in an in-depth interview and 366 instructors participated in the quantitative study. The majority of participants believed that e-Learning is applicable. However, almost all participants agreed that the infrastructures are inadequate at the University of Gondar. Five main themes emerged from an inductive thematic analysis which includes: perceptions of adopting online learning, challenges of adopting online learning, opportunities of adopting online learning, strategies to overcome challenges, and higher officials’ willingness and support. Most instructors and all higher officials are willing and happy to adopt. Internet connectivity, electric power, computer access, and poor perception of instructors, students, and employees will be a challenge to adopting e-Learning. Capacity-building training for the instructors and supporting teams and fulfilling infrastructures for the successful implementation of e-Learning at the University of Gondar is recommended.