IMPLEMENTING E- LEARNING PRACTICES AND INTEGRATION OF TECHNOLOGY AT HIGHER EDUCATION LEVEL IN PAKISTAN: PROBLEMS AND POTENTIALS

E-learning is a developed and modern form of classroom instructions basededucations in which students and teachers interact with one another through the mostadvance technology based visual instruments. In this context, e-learning is quitedifferent from traditional way of learning and partially from online or distancelearning. The purpose of this study was to examine the perceptions of students andfind out the problems and potentials regarding Implementation of E-LearningPractices and Integration of Communication and Technology at Higher Educationlevel in Pakistan. Most relevant and latest theory of connectivism was applied in thisstudy. The researcher adopted mixed methodology and qualitative and quantitativedata was collected through multi stage sampling technique. Total population of theselected public and private universities from five divisions of Punjab-Pakistan werefifty nine thousand one hundred and five (59105) students. In order to get the exactsample size for this study, three hundred and ninety seven (397) students wereselected through stratified sampling technique. After data collection, the Quantitativeand Qualitative Data Analysis were done through SPSS v.20 and Nvivo v.10respectively. Findings of this study show that the private universities’ students arecomparatively at better level of perception regarding e-learning practices and itspotentials than public universities. Findings of the qualitative analysis revealed thatthe students of both public and private universities consider the lack of resources,communication gap and technical skills as major issues towards implementing elearning practices. Further, the findings of this research also highlights a greatpotential of e-learning practices, if adopted, at higher education level for enhancingcritical thinking, positive perception, technical skills, less time consuming, costreducing, result-orienting and innovative learning to compete the internationaluniversities in quality education. The researcher recommends for providing e-learningresources, technical training as well as better communication skills among studentsand teachers through technology integration in classrooms to remove perceptional,conceptual and practical flaws towards e-learning practices at higher education levelin Pakistan