It is an undeniable fact that online studies have come to stay due to the global pandemic that the world is facing now and as such making it our last resort and only choice so long as our education is concerned. Trainees all over the country have lamented on numerous problems they face with virtual learning. Some of these are network accessibility, high cost in purchasing data bundle, unavailability of smartphones, mode of lesson delivery, unavailability of reading materials, among others.
Considering all these pressing challenges that trainees face, the introduction of the UCC LMS platform was a redeemer for trainees. It is doubtless that it has brought relief to both tutors and students but despite its goodness, there is still much more to do.
First of all, some colleges have not yet registered the courses of their students which is the key to opening the LMS website and hence depriving those students of their access to getting the resources there for educational use.
Secondly, since the LMS platform is not data-free, some of the trainees are still disadvantaged in accessing it. This is because their financial muscles do not have enough strength to match with the high cost of purchasing data bundle and as well considering the current trends in economic activities in the country. This affects their activeness in classes at times because they partake only when they are favored with some little bundle. They lose the chance to a detailed explanation from tutors to enhance their understanding of the lesson and asking questions for clarification in areas they face difficulty due to their inactiveness or irregularity in classes.
It is shocking to know that less than % of the student barely take part in most classes and this we can all conclude that it will go a long way to affect students” performance when they are being called on to the account.
Moving forward, we would kindly like to beseech that the various stakeholders of the UCC LMS platform consider zero-rating it, that is making its data free to make it more accessible to all students who can. It will even make accessing materials on the platform easy and possible at all times. We again plead that they should endeavor to register
all the courses on the platform as early as possible so that the readers of those particular courses will not feel left out.
Once again, we are pleading with the various College Managements to kindly divert part of the school fees components like utility, bed-user fee, and others into data packages for students to ameliorate our situation. This can be done alternatively if managements can liaise with various Student Representative Councils to make this effective for we cannot hold the stick at hand and wait for the snake to bite us. Also, we plead that the Teacher Trainees Association of Ghana (TTAG) negotiates for a reduction in the cost of data bundle purchases with the telecommunication companies to grant everyone
the ability to purchase them for our educational use or better still surprise all trainees with monthly data packages.
