Search results

The purpose of this paper is to determine the influence of students’ profiles and the usage of e-books, online educational materials, and other programming books on the adoption of printed programming textbooks for computing students. It was hypothesized that the predictor variable set could not explain any of the variance of the dependent variables.

This descriptive study utilized a content-validated questionnaire. The study involved 190 student participants. Canonical correlation analysis was employed to determine whether students’ profiles and use, perceived usefulness, and preference of e-books, online educational materials, and other programming books explained any variance in printed programming textbook adoption.

Printed programming textbook adoption could be explained by two functions. The first function revealed that the use and the perceived usefulness of textbooks were positively influenced by the use of e-books and other programming books and by the perceived usefulness of e-books, fora/blogs, other programming books, and YouTube. The second function revealed that the use of printed programming textbooks alone was positively influenced by the use of e-books and other programming books but was negatively influenced by the perceived usefulness of programming websites and YouTube and by the preference of programming websites over textbooks.

The study provided empirical evidence that e-books, other programming books, and online educational materials provide additional resources to students. Thus, e-books, online educational materials, and other programming books complement, rather than threaten, the existence of printed programming textbooks.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce an interactive system that relies on the educational data generated from the online Universities services to assess, correct and ameliorate the learning process for both students and faculty.

In the presented research, data from the online services, provided by a Greek University, prior, during and after the COVID-19 outbreak, are analyzed and utilized in order to ameliorate the offered learning process and provide better quality services to the students. Moreover, according to the learning paths, their presence online and their participation in the services of the University, insights can be derived for their performance, so as to better support and assist them.

The system can deduce the future learning progression of each student, according to the past and the current performance. As a direct consequence, the exploitation of the data can provide a road map for the strategic planning of universities, can indicate how the learning process can be updated and amended, both online and in person, as well as make the learning experience more essential, effective and efficient for the students and aiding the professors to provide a more meaningful and to-the-point learning experience.

Nowadays, educational activities in academia are strongly supported by online services, information systems and online educational materials. The learning design in the academic setting is primarily facilitated in the University premises. However, the exploitation of the contemporary technologies and supporting materials that are available online can enrich and transform the educational process and its results.

This study aims to show how a massive open online course (MOOC) can be used as an educational tool to diffuse specialised corporate sustainability research globally to a broad range of learners.

This study is based on insights from the design and implementation of a sustainable fashion MOOC. The MOOC was launched in late 2019 on a global learning platform and has recently passed 40,000 enrolments (February 2022). The presentation of the MOOC draws on quantitative and qualitative data available to instructors on the global learning platform.

Based on the data about the learners and their use of the MOOC, this study demonstrates how MOOC can be a powerful tool to diffuse sustainability research to new groups of learners, who differ significantly from the typical students at business schools and universities in the West. Moreover, the findings also demonstrate how the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the MOOC’s popularity.

This study provides new empirical evidence on how sustainability research can be translated into online education material of relevance for a broad range of learners from around the world. Moreover, the study also points to the number of practical and structural challenges linked to the future mainstreaming of MOOCs and other types of online education material.

The emergence of online education creates opportunities for positive education changes centering on improved learning rather than on reaping economies of scale. We can develop online strategies for using class time more productively; courses can be arranged to correspond to the varying learning curves of different students; and degrees can be tailored to the actual competencies students achieve. Further, the online world based in hypertext and virtuality creates the possibility of providing entirely new educational materials and environments. These improvements depend on faculty seizing control of the way technology is used in education.

Library managers are becoming increasingly concerned about document delivery systems because the means to identify and locate materials has improved faster than the ability to provide the materials and because a cut‐back in library budgets is forcing libraries to borrow or obtain more material from other sources. A new SPEC kit (no. 82, March 1982) has been produced on document delivery systems in use in the Association of Research Libraries. The September 1981 survey covered two categories of service: internal delivery — disseminating locally‐owned materials to users, and external delivery — acquiring materials from an outside source for local users. Some ninety ARL libraries responded to the survey by providing materials and information describing the methods they employ. These include telefax, requests via electronic mail and OCLC's interlibrary loan subsystem and online ordering from data‐bases. SPEC kit #82 contains twenty‐six documents, (101 pages) and is available for $15 (prepaid) from Systems and Procedures Exchange Center, OMS/ARL, 1527 New Hampshire Ave., NW, Washington DC 20036, USA.

The study aims to investigate the academic libraries' response to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic situation in Nigeria.

A survey research design was employed for the study. The population of the study was all the 584 approved academic institutions in Nigeria. A structured questionnaire administered online was designed to collect data with Google Form from heads of library (who are the chief principal officer) in all the academic institutions. The link to the survey was sent to the Nigeria Library Association (NLA) Online Forum, the platform on which Nigerian librarians fete and discuss issues relating to the profession. Social media tools such as WhatsApp and Telegram belonging to groups of academic librarians in Nigeria were also employed. The heads of the library from 108 academic libraries responded to the survey. The data generated were analyzed using a statistical tool and presented in tables.

The finding reveals that nearly all the students are not on campus since they have been directed to vacate their campus as a result of the lockdown. The study reveals some safety measures that were put in place by the libraries in Nigeria to include total closure of the library (59.3%), provision of hand sanitizer (55.6%) and the use of face mask and nose covers by library users (31.9%). The finding further indicates social distancing measures also put in place to include communication done via social media (59.3%), attendance to patrons (51.9%), class/lecture (51.9%), training/conferences (37%) and paper presentations (37%) that are all canceled, respectively. On access to library materials, a majority (87.96%) of the academic libraries in Nigeria provide only online materials to their users, while 9.26% of the academic libraries provide access to both prints and online materials.

The paper will contribute to the body of literature on academic libraries' response to the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria and beyond.

While the disease is still very much with the world, libraries have to continue providing information resources in support of the research studies and sensitize the world on the measures to take to curtail the pandemic.

The results can help other libraries find ways and means to adjust services, so that they can still meet the needs of users in this pandemic.

The global spread of the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the complete lockdown of almost every part of the world, including all educational institutions, resulting in the prompt implementation of online education to facilitate the students to carry on their learning. These conditions made the researchers study the experiences of online education among students and teachers. The influences of online teaching-learning during the COVID-19 pandemic undoubtedly offered numerous opportunities besides raising some challenges which impacted the overall psychology of students and teachers. So, this paper aims to conduct a systematic review of the research papers focussing on opportunities, challenges and psychological impacts raised due to the sudden shift to online education among students and teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

To conduct this systematic review, 19 articles published between July 2020 and May 2021 were considered and reported by following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA).

It was found that online education influenced the interests and experiences of the students and teachers and has immensely impacted their overall psychology. So, for the effective implementation of online and blended education, psychological well-being of students and teachers should be taken care of with properly designed instructions, adequate infrastructure or resources and satisfactory technological skills.

In the present study, the students were not categorised according to their subjects or streams, i.e. science, commerce, humanities, medical, dental, postgraduate or undergraduate. All the students were categorised into two categories only: (1) college students and (2) school students. And also, teachers were not categorised and were presented as a whole, as school, college or university teachers.

The current research identified the abrupt implementation of online education during the COVID-19 pandemic, which raised various challenges and psychological impacts among students and teachers besides offering them many opportunities in times of crisis.

Students and teachers constitute the educational community of society. They should get ample opportunities to develop skills for online education; challenges faced during online education should be identified and tackled, and the issues concerning the psychological well-being during online education for both teachers and students should be addressed to achieve sustained development of online education–blended learning environments.

The paper is the original research work based on the systematic review and concludes with suggestions for the future of online and blended pedagogy while taking care of the psychological needs of students and teachers in online and blended learning environments.

Integrating e-learning into higher education institutions (HEIs) is a complex process. Several universities had tried to impart learning online, especially amid the spread of COVID-19. However, they failed miserably due to the many barriers to online learning platforms’ delivery and acceptance. This study aims to explore the barriers and facilitators in adopting e-learning in HEIs of Pakistan by taking the perspective of key stakeholders involved in the management and administration of HEIs.

The authors recruited participants using purposive and snowball sampling. Interviews were conducted from a variety of participants, including academicians, administrators and information technology (IT) personnel. Data recorded was transcribed into verbatim and then analyzed using thematic analysis.

The analysis identified barriers and facilitators to the e-learning implementation. Barriers included lack of resources and training, lack of infrastructure, inadequate e-learning policies, absence of positive mindset among teachers and students and reservations and concerns about e-learning of parents and teachers. By contrast, facilitators included prior training and awareness (provided by HEIs regarding e-learning), the assistance of government and regulatory bodies (in terms of policy and training on e-learning), the role of IT (in development and implementation of online learning system) and good computer knowledge and skills of students and faculty. Moreover, respondents believed that teaching subjects online requires the availability of proper and complete gadgets, but these were hardly available due to high demand. Finally, the academicians and administrators believed that e-learning is indispensable in health emergencies such as COVID-19 and similar events ahead.

For the HEIs to sustain and grow, the adoption of e-learning is fundamental. Therefore, the government should provide the essential infrastructure for the HEIs to deploy e-learning modules, train faculty and ensure the availability of necessary equipment (e.g. network) and gadgets to faculty and students. From a theoretical perspective, the study provides a framework for similar future studies in other emerging markets, whereas practical implications of the study can assist the governments and HEIs of emerging markets in implementing the e-learning modes of education in times of health emergencies, such as COVID-19.

Nowadays, when mobile devices are actively evolving and penetrating the various spheres of human activity they have a potential to modernize and facilitate the sphere of IT education as well. This paper aims to test the hypothesis stating that introduction of mobile technology to the college-level database course for future IT specialists has a positive academic impact on students.

The main theoretical premises for the present study were the general findings of the surveys by Hinze et al. (2017) and Bowen and Pistilli (2012) indicating that: using mobile tools to work on classroom projects improves student’s academic success students, especially those from computing specialties, actively turn to mobile tools in their academic activity students favor the Android and iPhone platforms and prefer native mobile apps to Web-based mobile apps The key idea of the present study was to validate these general premises in the specific case of the college-level database class. Namely, the authors formulated a hypothesis that Android-based mobile devices have a positive impact on the IT students’ academic performance and interest in the subject at the college-level introductory database lessons. Throughout the study, the authors examined both quantitative (students’ scores and attendance rate) and qualitative aspects (students’ and teachers’ opinions) of the hypothesis.

Based on the experiment’s positive outcome resulting in students’ increased academic performance and interest in the subject, the authors conclude that in the context of the college-level database course mobile devices can successfully substitute traditional desktop computers and positively affect students’ academic activity.

Based on the experiment’s positive outcome resulting in students’ increased academic performance and interest in the subject, the authors conclude that in the context of the college-level database course mobile devices can successfully substitute traditional desktop computers and positively affect students’ academic activity.