An Investigation of Lecturers’ and students’ use of ICTs in Nigerian university education as a panacea for national development

The importance of ICT in boosting human capacity development and self realization prompted an investigation into lecturers’ and students’ use of ICTs in Nigerian university education as a panacea for national development in Rivers State. The study carried out in the two State owned Universities in Rivers State, Nigeria adopted the survey research design. Random sampling technique was employed in the selection of 1154 subjects (i.e. 146 lecturers and 1008 students). A 40 item and 20 item self structured test titled: “Information and communication Technology Usage Scale” (ICTUS) and National Development Inventory (NDI) validated by experts and with a reliability coefficient (ra) of 0.763 was used to analyze the data using t-test and regression analysis. The study revealed that the gender of university lecturers did not predict their usage of ICT while it also revealed that ICT usage contributed to national development. It was recommended among others that the National universities Commission (NUC) should commence an urgent review of the course content of university education, with a view at compulsorily incorporating ICT usage as a standard for all teaching, learning and examinations. Keywords: lecturers, students, ICT, university education, national development, Rivers State