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Purpose: This study aims to analyze the effectiveness of online teaching and learning in the higher education sector during the COVID-19 pandemic and thereby design and formulate strategies to overcome the lacunas, if any, to enhance teaching effectiveness. Design/methodology/approach: A survey was conducted to analyze how far students were able to adapt to online teaching and learning, access teaching platforms and afford it. It was also studied whether they were able to grasp and apply the concepts learned. A total of 600 questionnaires were given, and 372 complete responses were received. Structural equation modeling is employed to test the hypothesis. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted to test the model fit and measurement model. Findings: This study is first of its kind in India which aims to analyze the effectiveness of online teaching and learning environments. This research model is designed to identify the determinants of effective online learning and to overcome the lacunas existing in the prevailing online teaching methods. It can be applied not just during crises like the pandemic but also during normal times to make teaching and learning more economical, innovative and impactful. The present study examined the impact of five major determinants—adaptability, affordability, bandwidth, grasping and interaction—on online learning and its effectiveness during COVID-19. It was observed that all the determinants positively influence online learning effectiveness. Research limitations/implications: The scope of the study was restricted to three centrally funded Indian Universities. Other institutions were not part of the study. Originality/value: This study is the first of its kind done in the current COVID-19 scenario, and the outcome would help overcome the lacunas in the prevailing online teaching scenario across the globe and make it more effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a novel approach to management education (online classes) design by using a combined approach of clustering (based on student engagement level in online mode) and conjoint analysis to design relevant online classes for different segments of management students. We base our study on the responses received from 280 business management students in a University in the eastern part of India. The findings bring those attributes to the light which are most important to different segments of management students based on the level of their engagement in online classes. This will help course instructors in management education to design better online classes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background:The covid-19 outbreak adversely impacted the educational sector in India. Consequently, online education foisted in almost all the educational institutions in India, from primary to higher educational levels. Sudden shifts from traditional education to online education have impacted all three dimensions of the educational ecosystem, namely: the students & parents, the teachers, and the educational institutions. Many authors researched the difficulties of students, teachers, or institutions or concentrated on specific regions or a particular level of education in their research work. This research work has considered responses from the school level to higher education level from different institutes (public and private), considering the entire educational ecosystem (students, teachers, and institutions) across India, which distinguishes its contributions from others. Objectives: This paper put forward the positive and negative impacts of the pandemic on the educational ecosystem and their effect in the post-pandemic. So that new strategies can be designed to prevent the issues in the future to continue online education. Methods:Formal structured interview was conducted among teachers, students/parents, and administrative staff of Government and private educational institutions across India. Around 60 responses from each category were collected, analysed, and summarized. Results:It is identified that the unprivileged (belonging to below the poverty line & from families in which parents lost their job due to the pandemic) students could not attend the classes and could not pay the fee in time. Low-budget Educational institutions are affected a lot. Further findings have been elaborated in the Result & Discussion session. Conclusions: The study's findings might be helpful to the institutions, employers, and regulatory authorities of all educational institutions planning to implement online education as a regular activity in the future. The insights driven by the findings can make them revisit their existing policies and redesign the new strategies to succeed in online education in the future. Researchers could extend their research on finding the view of students in adopting online education considering various metric. The recommendations for practitioners would bring equal opportunity to all the students from various financial and societal backgrounds and improve overall student learning in India. Further research will understand the outcome of online education in various sectors, the consequences of online teachinglearning, and its impact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic is a major health crisis leading to lockdown in many countries. Many countries have closed schools, colleges and universities all over the world. Computers and smart phones have remarkably changed the learning and teaching environment. The distance learning is the learning method where teacher and students are not present at the same place. Methods: The present study was conducted to compare the views of distance learning technique with traditional classroom teaching in 3' MBBS medical college students. Data were collected by prestructured and validated questionnaire from 270 medical college students who were selected througli random sampling method. Data were analyzed with basic descriptive statistics and the percentage has been used. Results: In our study we found that 89. 62% of medical students believe traditional classroom teaching is more effective. Only 10.37% of medical students felt distance learning is better than traditional classroom teaching. Without attending classes, 34.44% students were able to understand the topic. Using distance learning without attending classes, only 36.66% students were able to understand the topic. Conclusion: From our study results we conclude that raditonal classroom teaching is better than distance learning. In the COVID-19 lockdown period we need to develop new methodologies and pedagogy to improve distance learning methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The teaching-learning system in India changed significantly during the COVID 19 pandemic situation. Educational institutions adopted blended learning approaches for effective teaching and used digital technologies to deliver academic programs. Online learning during pandemic situations helps learners learn the necessary skills to meet the need for future jobs conveniently and quickly. Graduates of vocational programs will have to play a crucial role in economic recovery. The study's objectives were to examine to what extent the open and distance learning students of IGNOU had prior digital skills, preferred, used digital platforms for study through online mode during the lockdown. A survey of vocational students studying through distance mode from Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), India was conducted to identify the reasons for their preferences to study through online mode rather than traditional distance learning mode during the lockdown. Researchers identified nine reasons based on the literature review for students' preferences to learn through online mode. The responses to nine sub-questions were on a five-point scale, i.e., Strongly agree (1), agree (2), can't say (3), disagree (4), and strongly disagree (5). The study was limited to vocational distance learners. Descriptive statistical methods like ANOVA, Chi-square, and t-test were applied to test the hypothesis. The results of ANOVA and Chi-square revealed that they value all the reasons equally, thereby rejecting the null hypothesis. The implication of the study is to adopt a blended learning approach for offering future distance learning programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background؛ The COVID-19 pandemic is a major health crisis leading to lockdown in many countries. Many countries have closed schools, colleges and universities all over the world. Computers and smart phones have remarkably changed the learning and teaching environment. The distance learning is the learning method where teacher and students are not present at the same place. Methods: The present study was conducted to compare the views of distance learning technique with traditional classroom teaching in 3' MBBS medical college students. Data were collected by prestructured and validated questionnaire from 270 medical college students who were selected througli random sampling method. Data were analyzed with basic descriptive statistics and the percentage has been used. Results: In our study we found that 89. 62% of medical students believe traditional classroom teaching is more effective. Only 10.37% of medical students felt distance learning is better than traditional classroom teaching. Without attending classes, 34.44% students were able to understand the topic. Using distance learning without attending classes, only 36.66% students were able to understand the topic. Conclusion: From our study results we conclude that traditional classroom teaching is better than distance learning. In the COVID- 19 lockdown period we need to develop new methodologies and pedagogy to improve distance learning methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies have claimed that use of multimedia technologies motivate and stimulate the learning of students as compared to using traditional teaching methods alone. Multimedia aids are therefore significant in effective teaching learning process. It is even more significant in open and distance learning where the learners are separated from their teachers by distances. The study has been done by using both qualitative and quantitative methods. Data has been collected from all the fifteen Open Universities of India. In this study, the researchers have attempted to understand the availability and delivery mechanism of different multimedia courseware in institutions imparting distance learning in India. The study will also provide interesting findings like commonly used or most preferred multimedia technology in these institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper traces the historical perspectives of open and distance education in India. It also discusses the various modalities and standards followed by various universities in offering social work education through open and distance learning (ODL) mode. It also highlights the achievements and challenges of social work education through ODL mode in India. The article will be extremely helpful to the academicians and policy makers in understanding the various dimensions of social work education through ODL mode in Indian context. The study recommends that Indira Gandhi National Open University model is one of the successful models of offering social work education through ODL mode. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper investigates the distance students' use of public libraries for their academic purposes and converse the public library as a alternate for instructive or University libraries. The current research study is based on a comprehensive survey of distance education students from Bangalore University. The data collection was carried out by personally distributing the questionnaire to the randomly selected students and the sample consists of students from both undergraduate and post graduate. It is found from the study that 1309 (90.60 %) distance learners who used public libraries during contact classes and 786 (54.4 %) of the respondents spent 0-1 h in the library. Majority of the distance learners i.e. 941 (65.10 %) responded effective for book borrowing services from the public libraries in seeking information, 1220 (84.40 %) opined effective for reference services. It is observed from the study that distance students have a tendency to look at libraries as a complete and do not make apparent difference between different types of libraries, expecting the entire system to be flawless. The paper lifts the significant executive inquiry and apprehension in relation to both the operation of public libraries and the service level given to diverse section of learning students. It is strongly recommended that library instruction programme should be organized by the public libraries for distance learners that create the responsiveness and use of library and information services effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Open and Distance Learning system is acknowledged and encouraged by distance learners because of its inherent characteristics like openness, freedom of time, pace and place. Its success is to a large extent dependent upon effective student support services built in the ODL system. This article analyses the practitioners' views and submits arguments for the effective student support services in ODL. It examines different definitions of support services, characteristics, problems and special needs at different stages of learners and various components constituting student support services. An attempt to classify the support services in to different domains and the justification for student support services are looked at. It concludes with the discussion on the built-in the need for humane element through support services for effective delivery of ODL Programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the use of educational methodology program for university teachers and trainers to improve their professional performance and effectiveness in teaching complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) course. It mentions that the study was conducted of the teachers affiliated at the CAM institutions of the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences in Karnataka, India. It also mentions the activities conducted at the contact program.

This study provides an overview about massive open online courses (MOOCs), about how technology has changed over the years the face of distance learning and how relevant and beneficial these courses might be for distance learners. Studies related to MOOCs in India and world around have been reviewed. It also furnishes the details of various MOOCs platform such as The Open University, Iversity, ALISON, Open Learning, Coursera, Udacity, EdX and EduKart available free of cost to distance learners. This paper further provides availability of MOOCs in India and various institutions and companies associated across the nation providing MOOCs courses to academia. Limitations of MOOCs and their future has also been discussed. The paper concludes that MOOCs and online education has a huge potential which would help in accelerating and ensuring social cohesion and sustainable growth. With little efforts by the government of India, online education can successfully reach every individual. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distance Learning will offer people a high educational environment to share their knowledge and ideas and upgrade their qualification. The advent of the Internet (Basher et al, 2008) opened a new door to distance education. It has given a chance to the deprived people to get educated at their doorstep. In India, nowadays, distance education is a popular tool for the people who want to acquire knowledge and upgrade qualification. We analyse the learning methodology, process and system of Sikkim Manipal University (SMU), Gangtok, Symbiosis Centre for Distance Learning (SCDL), Pune and Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), New Delhi. At present these institutions have successfully running different programmes in India and abroad. In our study we found that there is enough scope to improve the services of distance learning in India. Peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing system is one of the best systems to improve the quality of distance learning especially in higher education. Therefore we may install peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing system for University students which will give them opportunity to improve their knowledge. Use of Information Communication Technology (ICT) in distance learning also added a new dimension to improve the quality and timely information to the students. All are analysed here. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – Online education is becoming a major mode of learning, especially for working executives. An assessment of this learning mode is important to evaluate the quality of learning and may provide useful directions to effective management of online learning. This paper aims to focus on these issues.Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative research methodology was adopted to explore such issues as the reasons for undertaking web-based executive management education programs, the contributors to the learning effectiveness of such a program, and the individual and organizational expectations for undertaking or supporting such a program.Findings – It was found that there are some unique results in the Indian web-based executive education context, especially on the contributors to learning effectiveness. The most commonly mentioned reasons for undertaking an executive management education program are to gain knowledge/skills and to better handle present or future roles, while the most commonly expected outcome after completion refers to personal development/satisfaction and improved performance in the present job. The most important factors contributing to learning effectiveness relate to pedagogical factors and course design factors.Originality/value – While abundant research exists on web based management education in the Western context, the reasons for undertaking web-based executive management education programs, the contributors to learning effectiveness of such a program, and the expectations for undertaking such a program are still not well understood in the Indian context. This study provides useful pointers to these questions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In the world of technology, when today's student is approaching the on-line /distance learning in the open universities and doing on-line self-assessment, the classroom learning is vanishing slowly. Globally, teachers are taking efforts to improve the pedagogy by implementing effective methods to retain the classroom teaching and student attendance. The present study aims at shedding some light on the need of changing the adult education strategies (andragogy), which can effectively improve the student attendance for lectures. Methods: It is an observational study, and the conceptual framework of it is based on beliefs, opinions and personal experiences of the respondents. Triangulation method is used for collecting the data. The data is achieved from three groups of concerned population who could provide valid results to support the study. It is collected by interviewing 10 senior faculty members who are/were the 'education experts' in the universities, while the main concerned groups of present educational stream, i.e. 'institution-teachers' and the 'students', were given questionnaires. 570 teacher respondents and 200 student respondents are the main participants of this study. Results: As per data, it has been observed that senior faculty (90%) and students (93.25%) feel need of student motivation more than the institutional teachers (52.44%). P-values were obtained using Chi-Square test for testing the significance of difference between agreement and disagreement for a specific question. Conclusions: In India, Universities have already sensed the need of 'teacher development programmes'. But teachers in dental colleges, demand more efforts to be taken by universities and managements in this regard and expect better educational policies to give them accessibility to prove themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Christian Medical College (CMC), India, and Tufts University School of Medicine, USA, have developed an 'institutional hub and spokes' model (campus-based e-learning supporting m-learning in the field) to facilitate clinical education and training at remote secondary hospital sites across India. Iterative research, design, development, and testing merged three key elements for effective mobile learning: an underlying learning management system to organize data; mobile access to a knowledge repository using commonly owned phones; and mobile applications that match the learner, learning theory, and mode of learning based on student-articulated needs. CMC is institutionalizing academic and technical support for e-learning and m-learning, ensuring future sustainability. Assessing and sharing best practices for mobile-supported training and resources will leverage strengths and build capacity across the CMC-secondary hospital mobile/e-learning network. This model can advance interdisciplinary health training initiatives in developing countries, improving clinical services and health for underserved populations across the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Projections for the global economy frequently center on the BRIC countries: Brazil, Russia, India, and China. As futurists and economists alike define and re-define both formal and informal coalitions (for example, by broadening the R in BRIC to include all Eastern European economies or instead re-directing the discussion to G-8 countries or to World Trade Organization members), the education profiles of the individual nations sometimes resemble economic indicators: what is imported, what is exported, and what is the potential for expansion. Higher education, and specifically distance learning (the Clicks element of this paper), can already be charted in these terms for some nations. This paper describes the current role of distance learning in countries described as growing economies and proposes a typology for describing change as additional data become available. The paper informs readers of global developments in distance education, using the BRIC nations as examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The question why some learners successfully study through distance mode and others do not is increasingly becoming important as open and distance learning (ODL) has come to occupy a prominent place in providing higher education to large segments of the population in India. With barely, 1112 students studying through distance mode in 1962, the number has crossed 2.8 million in 2006. This article presents the findings of an empirical research study conducted to investigate the study habits of successful distance learners of the India Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU). Every year, nearly 70, 000-80, 000 pass out of IGNOU. What strategies were adopted by these diverse groups, what media they utilized, and what modes of support they prefered are some of the major issues addressed in this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This retrospective study was designed to assess the outcome of telemedicine technology supportive of educational collaboration among endocrine surgery peers and its impact on knowledge and skill development., Materials and Methods: The study was carried out in the Department of Endocrine Surgery in collaboration with School of Telemedicine and Biomedical Informatics, Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Lucknow, India, during October 1999-December 2012. Telemedicine activities were divided into various modules (e.g., case/problem-based learning, clinical grand rounds, postgraduate course/continuing medical education/conference). Endocrine surgeons participating in such sessions were divided into two groups (faculty and residents). A multimodule questionnaire was constructed based on a Likert scale (2-7 points) to test various aspects (e.g., technical performance, role in knowledge exchange, skill development, level of satisfaction, and future recommendations). Responses were expressed in proportions, and the chi-squared test was used to find the differences in opinions of the study groups., Results: The questionnaire was sent to 38 surgeons, of whom 36 replied (response rate, 94.74%); of these respondents, 14 were faculty and 22 were residents. More than 80% of participants felt that the technology helped in learning new things and strengthening relations with peers, whereas >90% were of the view that it helped in knowledge exchange and development of skills as well as was helpful in supporting clinical decisions. More than 90% of participants were satisfied and enjoyed using this technology and also were of the opinion that the technology should be integrated into other specialties. Satisfaction with the technology was excellent to good for 94.44% of participants. Both faculty and residents were of the same opinion, and there was no significant difference in their replies., Conclusions: Knowledge sharing in a collaborative environment using telemedicine technology has been found successful in a low-resource setting and is now adopted in the departmental educational program.