Pedagogical Review on the Impact of COVID-19 in Higher Institutions of South Africa: A Case Study of the University of Venda

DOI

10.2991/978-94-6463-630-7_19How to use a DOI?

Keywords

online teaching; work-integrated learning; institutional differentiation; inequalities

Abstract

The global outbreak of coronavirus (COVID-19) significantly impacted the higher education sector, leading to both adverse and beneficial consequences. In South Africa, higher education institutions were particularly affected, as existing inequalities and disparities became more pronounced. The enforcement of COVID-19 protocols, guidelines, and restrictions exacerbated these challenges, negatively influencing traditional face-to-face teaching and learning experiences. Consequently, institutions were compelled to rapidly transition to online education, a shift that was unfamiliar and challenging for both students and lecturers. This transition highlighted the inequalities present in online education, research activities, and experiential learning, presenting substantial obstacles. The objective of this study was to investigate the impact of COVID-19 on teaching and learning, and research at the University of Venda. The research was informed by social justice theory and connectivism theory. A qualitative methodology was employed to examine the pedagogical practices during the pandemic at the University of Venda. The study involved purposively selecting six lecturers and ten students from the Department of Social Work within the Faculty of Humanities, Social Sciences, and Education. Data were collected through face-to-face semi-structured interviews and subsequently analyzed thematically. Key findings included disparities among higher education institutions, resource shortages, and a lack of familiarity with information and communication technology (ICT).

Copyright

© 2024 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Mamaleka Mmaphuti
AU  - Makgopa Mokgale
AU  - Manganyi Patricia
PY  - 2024
DA  - 2024/12/31
TI  - Pedagogical Review on the Impact of COVID-19 in Higher Institutions of South Africa: A Case Study of the University of Venda
BT  - Proceedings of the Focus Conference (TFC 2024)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 339
EP  - 358
SN  - 2667-128X
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6463-630-7_19
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6463-630-7_19
ID  - Mmaphuti2024
ER  -