School Administrators’ Views on Problem Situations and Solution Recommendations in Distance Education during Covid-19 Pandemi

Abstract

This study was conducted to get school principals’ views on transition to the distance education (via TRT-EBA TV and Education Information Network), which was implemented within the scope of the measures taken at schools in Turkey with Covid-19 pandemic, to identify the problems at schools in this process, to determine the activities to overcome the problems and to reveal administrators’ recommendations. In this qualitative research, the phenomenology design was preferred. The study was carried out in the spring semester of the 2020-2021 academic year. 15 school administrators working in Gaziantep were included in the study using the maximum sampling method. Due to the pandemic conditions, interviews were held with the participants by technological devices and data were collected in this way. The data were analyzed by content analysis. According to the findings, problems concentrated under four main headings (categories) at schools during pandemic. These are technology, adaptation, planning and school-family cooperation. In line with the school administrators’ views, problem situations were identified in sub-headings such as access to technology-based (online) education, student's technological proficiency, students' attendance in online classes, the environment in which students attend in distance education, distance education experience, supervision in distance education, teachers' adaptation to distance education, students' adaptation to distance education, psychological state and motivation, communication, preparing course schedules, arranging lessons such as remunerating the courses and calculating additional course allowances, planning in-school activities, providing parents' support for distance education and establishing school-family cooperation. Many activities and administrator recommendations to eliminate these problems were determined and presented in tables in the findings section. At the end of the study, some recommendations such as improving the infrastructure providing access to distance education, organizing trainings to increase technology literacy for both teachers and students, etc. were included for practitioners, policy makers and researchers.