A Framework for Successful Deployment of E-Learning in Developing Countries: A Case Study of Rural Areas of Pakistan

Abstract

The purpose of this research work was to highlight the factors which might contribute to the successful deployment of E-learning in individual, technological and institutional perspective in the rural areas of Pakistan. It further proposed that an ICT platform can effectively bridge the identified gaps and deployed an efficient E-learning platform. In order to probe the factors affecting E-learning systems several close ended questionnaires were used. To fill the close ended questionnaire probability cluster sampling technique was used. The adopted close-ended questionnaires were filled by the university students belonging to the rural areas of Pakistan. The results of this study showed that individual perspective consisting of student’s characteristics and instructor’s characteristics had a significant positive effect on the deployment of E-learning. The technological perspective also had a significant positive effect on the E-learning deployment. Additionally, an institutional perspective which consisted of E-learning environment, learning methods, school building and computing resources also had significant positive association on the E-learning deployment in the rural areas of Pakistan. Process control analysis was implemented to analyse the effect of internal and external challenges on the E-learning deployment. The results showed that both internal and external challenges created hindrance for the individual roles (student’s and instructor’s characteristics) and technological perspective in the E-learning deployment. The institutional perspective (E-learning environment, learning methods, school building and computing resources) is influenced by external challenges for the E-learning deployment. However, institutional perspective is not influenced by the internal challenges for the successful deployment of E-learning in the rural areas of Pakistan. The results of the study indicated that individual perspective (student’s characteristics & instructor’s characteristics), technological perspective and institutional perspective (E-learning environment, learning methods, school building and computing resources) contributed to the successful deployment of E-learning but it is required to mitigate the associated internal and external challenges which do create hindrance for E-learning deployment in the rural areas of Pakistan. Furthermore, the proposed framework for deployment of E-learning was tested in real time setting at Virtual Campus. The findings reinforced that all factors of proposed framework are critical for successful deployment of E-Learning in marginalized communities of Pakistan. Additionally, the author also compared the new framework with existing approaches and found it relatively more suitable for efficient deployment of E-learning. During COVID-19 pandemic the proposed framework of virtual campus allowed university to swiftly shift major classroom workload to Learning Management System and Campus Management System of Virtual Campus and to continue with the academic activities.