Volume 14 Issue 4 (2021)

Benefits of online education or shortcomings of the traditional system?

Tudor Macavei¹, Valentina Iuliana Manea¹, Costin Pribeanu²

¹ Technical University of Civil Engineering
   Bd. Lacul Tei 122-124, Bucharest, Romania

² Academy of Romanian Scientists
   Splaiul Indpendentei 54, Bucharest, Romania

Abstract. The pandemic generated by the Coronavirus COVID-19 forced universities to shift from face-to-face to online education. This change has been a challenge for both teachers and students, as well as for the institution. Inherently, the new situation triggered a comparison with the traditional system and for many students, it seems to bring unforeseen benefits. A closer look at students’ opinions reveals that apart from the contextual advantages, online teaching and learning are surpassing or fixing several limitations or shortcomings of the traditional system. The objective of this research is to analyze in more detail the students' positive perceptions of online teaching and learning from a new perspective. The analysis revealed several shortcomings of the pre-existing system: lack of a structured repository of educational materials, scarcity of learning support, poor access to information of interest, issues related to communication with teachers, and issues related to the quality of the learning environment.

Keywords: online education, pandemic, engineering education, benefits of online learning.

Cite this paper as:
Macavei, T., Manea, V. I., Pribeanu, C. Benefits of online education or shortcomings of the traditional system?. International Journal of User-System Interaction 14(4), 119-130, 2021.