INTRODUCTION

Emerging countries rely not only on scale of economy but now also on ever needed new learning technological platforms, multimedia solutions and digital educational contents known as digital infrastructure. Today’s student plays Wi-Fi as the most important service within higher education environment. Classroom experience has now crossed four walls of traditional environment, while education providers are striving to reduce expenses as well.

The DIVIDE Exposed

COVID-19 is another new challenge for HEI’s around the world; enforcing higher education institution to scrape all campus based academic and operational activities. This new threat will not just be affecting academic operations; but also international student migration for further research activities. Pakistan governance, commerce and education is still on traditional infrastructure and tools. Pakistan currently has 120 million mobile subscribers uses as per telecom industry; and the balance should be to expand fix broadband usage. Problem is the gap of existing capacity and actual usage in diverse demographic stretch of the country. This pandemic has not only challenged country existing digital infrastructure but the digital divide is now ever far visible than before. Advance economies like EU may face issues like internet high speed; but in Pakistan our higher education institutions will face critical issue of where to begin on first place?

Currently HEI’s used ZOOM, Google Classroom , WhatsApp , Social Media and Hangout. While handful of private institutes and the privilege can enjoy online classes; there are millions that either have no access nor means. SMART education program by HEC and Jazz Smart School project is an effort which can connect students. But how beneficial it will be is still anybody guess.

COVID-19 has now challenged countries IT users and education providers to utilize their strengths; with most challenging aspect in smart devices utilization, internet connectivity, student mobility and traditional faculty’s capacity to change. Recently we have seen Higher Education Commission directing Universities to explore online options to ensure completion of academic cycle and prepare for the worst. Most Universities have either ceased their academic delivery or created confusion among students with poor online delivery mechanism. Claim of minor successes with HoD of faculty attending exhaustive online classes with less interactivity and soon to be a collapsed effort. Education providers are scrambling to use Skype, Zoom, WhatsApp and some custom base LMS mechanism. Government success story is seem with President of Pakistan initiative to train students with advance tools like Artificial Intelligence , Block Chain  and other applications online for Free. Even a private school in Sindh province notified parents of a comprehensive online solution; which is yet to bear its fruit as Cambridge exams are now being cancelled.

ICT LITREACY

Evidently; students at Universities are not ready nor have the proficient skills navigating the digital environment and also considerable lack of skills in online blended programs (Burck, 2005; Manca Ranieri, 2013).  Total number of people online today are closer to 3.5 billion  out of which 2.5 billion are in developing countries alone  (ITU 2016a, 4). Literature argue upon importance of internet access as well as importance of trained staff, resources and capacity building of all stakeholders.

THE LITERACY GAP

Looking beyond the usage GAP Pakistan also suffers from significant high illiteracy population of 10,534,212 (Age 15-24 ; UNESCO 2017) with Government education spending just over 2.9% of its GDP. It has also seen among families with parents having a college degree will have access to internet or computers; while parents with less education will be less advantaged. Although one can argue that some students may be more technically proficient than their parents but they still may not be knowledgeable when it comes to connotations associated with technology. This is why we see Universities struggling to keep students motivation for online classes.

DIGITAL DIVIDE & SCOIO ECONOMIC IMPACT

Digital Divide seems to be more severe based on social and economic background of students (Buzzetto-Hollywood et al., 2018). Buzzetto in his article argued the information literacy challenge as educational inequality in the US. Even for a nation like US ; technological readiness of students with skill deficiencies will effect actual access. Educational institutions must address Information literacy as ability of an individual to collect, evaluate, assemble to learn problem-solving and decision making process. Buzzetto, study sheds light to very important aspect of Higher Education feeling the Digital Divide now; as students coming from various background are under prepared.

Argued by Mishra et al. (2015) of students using search engines for information access proficiency rather than being skilled in productive software. This is very true when they take up IT courses at University level without having knowledge of spreadsheets, databases, operating systems, cyber security and core software applications. Study concluded that students as freshman never gained basic computer skills to be academically proficient and industry ready. This is now a reality when HEI’s are now down to very basic of software access to deliver online classes.

EMERGING DIGITAL PLATFORM IN HIGHER EDUCATION

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Communal learning environment has basic problem of teacher-student teaching ratio this is where Digital platform will bring the balance. Artificial Intelligence services on digital platform will give the interface and highly useful information to faculties. AI has introduced software that encodes thousands of defined rules and set of instructions which are processed in a fractions of second (Pasquale 2015).  Very early stages in Pakistan which also lacks knowledge to control algorithm. Although Department of Robotics and Intelligent Machine Engineering (RIME) NUST, established in 2011 and other institutes like PIAIC to promote AI, Block Chain and IOT.

MACHINE LEARNING

According to experts machine learning can be traced as far as 1696 (Geiger, 2014). Universities in Pakistan have also used techniques and modern tools to be distinctive with objective to retain students as well. Analytic and predictive modeling techniques now used in Business sector, now also adopted by Universities and academic communities. So, simply Machine Learning is a computer program, which has repetitive tasks associated by certain information. In Pakistan, machine learning is employed in games and yet to discover other benefits of this AI driven technology. There is an attempt to encourage faculty evaluation data by Machine learning in Pakistan (Islam, N., 2018); and convert it to improve course content, methodology and even teaching style. This would be important as most Universities in Pakistan do not have a formal teaching module system in place; which can be converted into online teaching mechanism. By analyzing lectures using speech recognition tools; will also benefit students with special need having access to remote network tools; even mobile applications.

LEARNING MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS (LMS)

LMS connects students and instructors in a very standardized manner through a developed software for a very specific learning outcome. LMS were developed to deliver certain contents and evaluate student performance (P. Moses, 2014). Academicians can create education work flow, collaborate with’n the system, create evaluation criteria for students, integrate with other online tools and also enable mobile access. Popular LMS available are BLACKBOARD, SCHOOLOGY, BRIGHTSPACE, CANVAS, MOODLE, SAKAI, LEARNDASH, LIFTERLMS, SENSEI, LEARNPRESS etc. Distance learning early adopters in Pakistan was AIOU ; with eight public universities adopting CMS system. MOODLE currently used was adopted to support the OLIVE program as a synchronous of learning and teaching. Although LMS is in very early stages; and lacks vital student generated content to support WEB 2.0 approach to enhance e-learning.

Current state of HEI’s

Developing countries like Pakistan, is already experiencing usage of mobile phone and online library access as part of technological demand; but very little as practical use. Such phenomenon where actual usage and access to digital infrastructure is known as ‘digital divide”; which is very new to Pakistan. Although we have experienced online phenomenon like virtual university and e-learning experiences of AIOU, Preston University, COMSATS, and University of Peshawar web enabled materials. Most higher education institutions in Pakistan rely on library access and some interactive multimedia resources; mostly for internal student population which has its own quality issues. Distance learning was encouraged by government owned university; which also includes its own TV channel as monologue teaching tool.

Reason for such confusion in Pakistan HEIs is relying on traditional ICT services as marketing sell off; and not expanding on emerging new intermediary platforms and innovative services in software’s and applications. We also see physical access, motivation towards change and necessary skills in complex Digital Divide among education providers. Problem cannot be answered in simple having a perfect infrastructure and some trained people; but rather gradual built of expertise through smart device users with application usage. Although Pakistan penetrating internet network with 161 million mobile users according to PTA 2019 figures. Universities must think of projects line NIC (National Incubation centre) where Telecom and Industry comes together to encourage Digital Entrepreneurship.

WAY FORWARD (Bridging the Divide)

Academic insight towards practical solution is required as there are less publish reviews on this challenge in Pakistan. We may find newspaper articles addressing usage of social media and mobile internet among subscribers; but #COVID-19 has sensitized the vital domestic HEI’s capacity. Pakistan Higher Education Commission has rightly pointed out the challenge; but struggles to provide common plate form, leaving HEI’s scrambling for individual capacity base solutions.

1. Universities will now have to look upon their own research departments of computer science, Cyber security, IT and even business management to find their own Digital platform like KHAN Academy or CISCO digital platform to move towards DIGITAL CAMPUS.
2. Enhancing capabilities of ONLINE LIBRARY (Digital Library) will build Universities capacity to connect with its students, expand research through DATABASES, and assist academics for delivery of lectures / assessments.
3. Also traditional teaching methodology must make a shift towards IT literacy and usage of web based tools.
4. Prevent Digital WASTE (Content Consumption) and encourage Digital Entrepreneurship (KEY IS CONNECTIVITY) towards INNOVATION, with more open base solutions.
5. Seek collaboration among established Digital Campuses with global partnership with other HEI’s .

References

1. Burck, S. (2005). ONLINE STUDENT SUPPORT SERVICE. Community College Journal, 76(2), 26.
2. ITU: ICT Facts and Figures 2016. Geneva 2016a
3. Manca, S., & Ranieri, M. (2013). Is it a tool suitable for learning? A critical review of the literature on Facebook as a technology-enhanced learning environment. Journal of  Computer Assisted Learning, 29(6), 487-504. doi:10.1111/jcal.12007
4. Buzzetto-Hollywood, N., Elobaid, M., & Elobeid, M. (2018). Addressing Information Literacy and the Digital Divide in Higher Education. Interdisciplinary Journal of ELearning and Learning Objects, 14(1), 77-93.
5. Mishra, S., Cellante, D., & Kavanaugh, L. (2015). Assessing the usefulness of a core introductory information systems course in undergraduate curriculum: An experimental study. Issues in Information Systems, 16(1), 31- 40
6. Pasquale, F (2015). The black box society. The secret algorithms that control money and information. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.
7. Islam, N., 2018. A Novel Framework Using Machine Learning to Effectively Analyze the Faculty Evaluations. Journal of Education & Social Sciences 6, 40–52. https://doi.org/10.20547/jess0621806204 .
8. P, Moses, W. Z. W. Ali, and S. E. Krauss, “Cause analysis of learning management system: role of moderator in improving students’ performance,” Research and Practice in Technology Enhanced Learning, vol. 9, no. 1, pp. 83–105, 2014.

Author (Mr. Mansoor Hayat Butt) looks after UK TNE program at Riphah International University; with over 20 years of industry experience. For suggestions please comment or contact at mansoorhb@hotmail.co.uk