Barriers of Distance Education at Iraqi Universities: Analysis Study

Abstract

The current study aimed at investigating distance education barriers within Iraqi universities. The design of the study was quantitative in nature and for this purpose, 150 Iraqi university teachers and students participated in this study. The universities were from all around Iraq. The participants were both male and female. The students’ age ranged between 22 to 31, and the teachers’ age ranged between 35 to 45. They all had the same mother tongue which is Arabic, and all of them had experienced distance education during Covid 19. Data were gathered through an online questionnaire. After the administration of the questionnaire, the responses were codified by numerical values and then were analyzed using descriptive statistics in SPSS version 24. Results suggested that the mean of all responses from both sides were over three, which indicated that, both teachers and students experienced certain barriers in distance learning education in Iraqi universities. The findings are discussed with regard to each barrier. The distance learning barriers were categorized as personal barriers, technical barriers, pedagogical barriers, organizational barriers and financial barriers.