E-Learning Readiness for College Students

-Survey using google forms to be filled by students

The present survey is designed by TERRE Policy Centre (terrepolicycentre.com) under its
project of Smart Campus Cloud Network (sccnhub.com)

The survey is designed to assess the preparedness in terms of access and quality of
infrastructure related to e-learning for college students. There are several opportunities that
have emerged for widening the reach of higher education under the present circumstances,
where Gross Enrollment Ratio in higher education is below 40%.

Several hours of lectures on online platforms such as Zoom or Google meet, giving written and
viva exams online along with other manner of coursework added to the online platform have
meant different outcomes for different students depending on the preparedness of their colleges
and their own preparedness- determined by factors such as regularity of internet and electricity,
availability of devices appropriate for learning and several other qualitative aspects such as
attentiveness generated and skillful delivery by lecturers.

India currently has 95.2 % of its population who have access to electricity (World Development
Indicators, 2017), 86 mobile cellular subscriptions for every 100 people (World Development
Indicators, 2018). However, it does poorly in terms of hours of service of its electricity as well as
internet connections, only 1.3 people per 100 people have a broadband connection in India;
Further there is a lack of access to laptops and computers in the country which creates serious
barriers to learning.

In light of this we have designed our survey to assess the situation better and understand the
lack of infrastructure creating barriers of access and feasibility of higher education in India. The
All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE, 2019) 2018-19 showed that at the undergraduate
level itself about 6.4 million students graduated from various programs in the previous
academic year in India. Given such a large population of the students graduating each year,
reducing the digital device is an urgent and pressing concern. Thus, our sample will be
Undergraduate and post graduate students from all over the country.

Objective:
The survey is designed to understand the following-
A) Availability of e-learning infrastructure with students
B) Quality and access related aspects of such infrastructure
Scope

The scope of this survey encompasses the demographics of college students according to degree,
Age, Rural-Urban area and Gender, particularly focusing on the assessment of key infrastructure
related determinants in online learning. The parameters which the survey focus on are the
following aspects of internet learning related infrastructure-

1. Regularity
2. Speed
3. Access
4. Cost
5. Satisfaction
6. Urgency for learning

The survey further contextualizes the results for each student by understanding the proportion
of course learning that is shifted to online platform. This aids in understanding the readiness of
the student relative to the urgency with which they need to be prepared vis-à-vis their
coursework. Further the study wishes to make some remarks on the correlation between the
outcomes and the category of Rural/Urban, Male/Female.

Expected outcome

After getting the results we would be calculating a ‘student e-learning readiness index’,
using weighted averages of each indicators. Each indicator would be assigned an ordinal value.

The expected outcome will show favorable results for urban areas in terms of availability and
access of infrastructure and lesser among rural areas. The expected satisfaction over online
learning is undetermined. We hope to make the findings robust and make the results sharable
and to the benefit of all researchers as well as institutions so they have a guiding framework for
understanding this issue.