TEACHERS' PERSPECTIVE ON EMERGENCY REMOTE TEACHING DURING COVID-19 AT TERTIARY LEVEL

Revising the way we organize the teaching activities is never an easy task even under normal circumstances, and when the state of emergency and the use of digital technology are added to the mix, the situation becomes even more complicated. During this process, it is easy to forget that although the content of teaching remains the same, the ways of delivering that content will change. Accustomed to synchronous, direct communication in a traditional classroom, we are now faced with asynchronous channels and a modular approach to teaching with the help of digital tools that are (un)known to us and which, despite their apparent value, present barriers to teaching and learning for various reasons such as Internet access, digital skills, adequate equipment, and economic and social status. Despite the development of digital technology and the exponential growth of digital applications and tools that have paved the way for online education worldwide in recent years, our emergency response to the pandemic indicates the lack of readiness of educational institutions for this type of change. Therefore, the paper examines how university teachers perceive the emergency remote teaching imposed on them from March to September 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The research problem of this study concerns the affective attitudes of the lecturers at the University of Pristina in Kosovska Mitrovica towards emergency remote teaching. Namely, the authors are set with the task of investigating how teachers perceive the new reality and how they have managed to acclimate to emergency remote teaching. For the purposes of this study, three major schools at the University were selected: the Faculty of Philosophy, the Faculty of Arts, and the Faculty of Medicine. The three schools represent the bulk of the University academic offer: sciences, humanities, and arts. The data is compiled by means of a survey, while the respondents are selected by the convenience sampling technique. The aim of the study is to present the analysis of the data obtained in order to develop a future training programme for university lecturers in principles and practices of the distance education and to improve the emergency response of the higher education institutions as a whole.