CHALLENGES OF E-LEARNING IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES: THE UGANDAN EXPERIENCE

Uganda introduced universal primary education (UPE) in 1997 and the country witnessed a dramatic increase in the enrolment in primary education countrywide which also increased the ratio of pupils-to-teachers, classroom congestion and limited learning resources thereby forcing schools to teach in sessions (morning and afternoon) for nearly all classes. Over time, this high enrolment with all its problems were transferred to secondary schools prompting the government of Uganda to introduce universal secondary education (USE), and several years later this effect reached the universities. To overcome these challenges, the universities and higher learning institutions adopted the use of information and communication technologies, also referred to as e-learning in their academic environments to facilitate teaching, learning and collaboration. The adoption of and implementation of e-learning was met with numerous challenges and constraints and this paper therefore investigates the challenges faced as a result of large classes consequential from bulky enrolment and also explores the measure in context to their academic environment that were adopted to overcome the limitations.