Information and communication technology facilitated education in national universities of Sri Lanka

Abstract

The global adoption of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has majorly captured the area of education, as it is the foremost important method to create a technology equipped generation. Uses of ICTs in education are widespread and are continually growing worldwide. However in many cases, the adoption has not kept its promises up to the expected standard. The main purpose of the study is to investigate the related factors that have a significant influence on the use of ICT facilitated education in National Universities of Sri Lanka. These factors contain the Organizational Factors, Individual Factors, Educator Factors, Technological Factors and Social/Cultural Factors. Further the study also aims at assessing whether ICT facilitated education in National Universities would improve the Digital Literacy of the students. The study uses a quantitative method to collect data on the population of graduates of national Universities of Sri Lanka. Questionnaire responses are analyzed for the findings and 176 graduates selected from the three national universities. The results of the study confirms that Organizational, Educator and Technological Factors act as barriers for effective implementation of ICT facilitated education in national universities of Sri Lanka. At the same time the expected outcome of ICT facilitated education which is improving the Digital Literacy has not achieved. Based on the findings, it is recommended that policy-makers should attempt to alleviate the concerns of barriers found and try to take steps to convert the barriers in a favorable manner.