eLearning Readiness of Higher Education Faculty Members

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced all institutions of higher education around the world to search for various new strategies to ensure the continuity of learning. This emergency eLearning situation created by the pandemic forced the faculty members of higher education to integrate information and communication technology in their teaching learning practices more than ever before. The present cross sectional survey study explores the readiness of higher education faculty members towards eLearning in terms of their technological readiness, pedagogical readiness, resource readiness and attitude. A self-developed likert scale consisting of 62 items measuring various dimensions of eLearning readiness was used to collect the data from 421 faculty members. The findings of the study revealed that demographic factors like age, gender, level of education, designation and discipline does not have any significant influence on the eLearning readiness scores of faculty members while teaching experience had a significant influence. The overall score of e-learning readiness was found to be satisfactory. The technological readiness of faculty members was found to be high compared to their other eLearning readiness dimensions scores. Faculty members were found to be least ready in terms of their pedagogical readiness and attitude towards eLearning. To increase the eLearning readiness of faculty members, the higher education institutions should organize more and more training and also provide the faculty members with adequate software and hardware required for adoption of eLearning practices.