Abstract
The COVID-19 episode has left the institutions worldwide, which were earlier reluctant to change their traditional pedagogical approaches, with no choice than an emergency shift to virtual learning, creating several arguments associated with digital infrastructure, digital divide, digital literacy, technical and pedagogic skills of teachers, digital contents and so on. With this background, this study intended to assess the implementation mechanism of COVID-19-lockdown-induced emergency online learning at undergraduate level in Assam, its effectiveness, and finally the problems faced therein, from the perspective of students’ experience and satisfaction. Primary data were collected from 132 undergraduate students drawn at random from different provincialized colleges in Assam through using a questionnaire in Google Form structured on the basis of available literature. The result revealed that 46.21% students perceive emergency online learning partially effective, 34.09% as effective, and 19.70% as ineffective. Poor Internet connectivity, irregular electricity, high cost in data plans, lack of compatible devices, lack of conducive environment at home, lack of technical and pedagogic skills of teachers, insufficient students’ engagement and so on, turned out to be the main challenges of online learning. Thus, the findings sufficiently yield the need of collaborative effort to improve digital infrastructure, reduce cost involvement and well-structured teachers’ training on pedagogical and technical skills. Creating, adopting and evaluating innovative techniques and tools, student-friendly contents, and above all a positive attitude are next to none measures to be accelerated for inclusive and effective online delivery of higher education in India in coming days.
Highlights
The COVID-19 episode has scrammed every sectors of human existence
In India, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the first phase of nationwide lockdown of 21 days starting with 25 March 2020, which is further extended to several phases
The primary purpose of the study is to throw light on the implementation mechanism of COVID-19-lockdown-induced emergency online learning at undergraduate level in Assam, assess its effectiveness, and the problems faced therein, from the perspective of students’ experience and satisfaction
Summary
The COVID-19 episode has scrammed every sectors of human existence. As per the World Health Organization, a total of 42,512,186 people contracted the virus worldwide including 1,147,301 deaths as on 25 October 2020, while India stands at second position soon after the USA with 7,864,811 confirmed positive cases and a demise figure of 118,534. In India, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the first phase of nationwide lockdown of 21 days starting with 25 March 2020, which is further extended to several phases. The Reserve Bank of India saw the COVID-19 outbreak, and subsequently, prolonged lockdown is likely to have a devastating impact on the overall economy of the country (Das & Guha, 2020). The educational institutions in the country, starting with pre-primary to tertiary level, are closed from 25 March 2020 and continued to shut down till October mid in spite of gradual unlocking process. The University Grants Commission, the higher education regulatory body of India, to its commitment to provide quality education, has urged and suggested the institutions to shift to online mode of teaching and evaluation. The institutions that were earlier reluctant to change their traditional pedagogical approaches are left with no choice than to shift entirely to online mode (Dhawan, 2020)
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