This document analyzes access and use of ICT (information and communication technology) for eLearning in Nigerian tertiary institutions. It finds that while the Nigerian government has advanced ICT policies and infrastructure to support education, most institutions still face challenges in effective ICT implementation. Specifically: (1) Lecturers lack experience and training in using technology for teaching; (2) Infrastructure and internet access remain limited at many schools; and (3) Pedagogy remains largely teacher-centered despite goals of transforming to student-centered learning. Overall progress has been made but more support is needed for successful ICT integration in Nigerian education.

1. Access and use of ICT for eLearning:
A Case Study of Nigerian Tertiary
Institutions
Awoyemi Akinade
Systems Analyst
Adeyemi College of Education, Ondo, Nigeria
akinawoyemi@yahoo.co.uk

2. INTRODUCTION
• ICT provides new ways to engage students, such as
classroom management software.
• ICT is being used not only in administrative duties in
education but also in the instruction of students.
• The use of technologies such as PowerPoint, Mobile
Note Taker and interactive whiteboard is capturing the
attention of students in the classroom.
• ICT is also being used in the assessment of students,
One example is the Audience Response System (ARS),
which allows immediate feedback tests and classroom
discussions

3. Intro’ cont
• There has been a paradigm shift in several Tertiary Institutions in Nigeria
with many of these institutions engaging in introducing, implementing and
supporting ICT initiatives aimed at developing educational services.
• This paper aims at providing a description and analysis of the current state
of ICT implementation in Tertiary Institution in Nigeria.
• A study of 10 Tertiary Institutions was conducted using open-ended
questionnaires.
• The results show that the country has advanced greatly in terms of design
and implementation of ICT policies, as well as telecommunication.
• Agencies under the Federal Ministry of Communication and Technology,
such as NITDA and NCC supports ICT infrastructure capacity building in
Tertiary Institutions through its nationwide network that interconnects
academic and research institutions.

4. Nigeria Government e-Education
Initiatives
There are presently at least nine ICT for education initiatives at various stages
of development in Nigeria. They include:
• a. The Nigerian Universities Network (NUNet) Project
• b. The Polytechnics Network (PolyNet) Project
• c. The School Net Project
• d. The Nigerian Education, Academic and Research Network (NEARNet)
• e. The Teachers Network (TeachNet) Project
• f. National Open University
• g. National Virtual (Digital) Library (Ministry of Education/ NUC)
• h. National Virtual Library (Ministry of Science and Technology/NITDA)
• i. National Information, communication and education programme of
the Presidency

5. Objectives of the Study
The main objectives are to examine the:
• The current state of implementation of ICT for
learning in Nigeria
• Institutional policies and frameworks for the
adoption of ICT for learning in Nigeria
• ICT Infrastructure in Nigeria Tertiary Institutions
• Access and use of ICT by Students and Lecturers
in Nigerian Tertiary Institutions
• Stakeholders involved in promotion ICT for
Learning in Nigeria
• Challenges and Limitation to adopting e-learning
in Nigeria

6. METHODOLOGY
• Qualitative data by means of a questionnaire with open-ended questions
was used to collect data from the selected 10 Schools (7 Public
Institutions and 3 Privately owned Institutions spread across Nigeria.)
• Responses were received. In some cases when the returned answers were
unclear, phone conversations were used to gain clarity.
• In addition, we acquire official documents from several institutions
including statements of institutional vision and strategic plans.
• In the descriptive analysis, the contents of the questionnaires and
interviews were analyzed response-by response, and then analyzed based
on categories and subcategories of responses of the questions.
• The data analysis process also included the comparison between the
responses and information from documents like institutional vision,
strategic plans, and project reports to augment the quality of information
across the whole data set.

7. FACTORS FOR SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION OF ICT
IN EDUCATION
Listed are factors that prevent teachers from using technology
in learning:
• 1) lack of experience on the part of teachers with ICT,
• 2) lack of on-site support for teachers using technology,
• 3) lack of help supervising students when using
computers,
• 4) lack of ICT specialist teachers to teach students
computer skills,
• 5) unavailability of computers,
• 6) lack of time required to successfully integrate
technology into the curriculum, and
• 7) lack of financial support.

8. CASE STUDY, ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION
We chose in this study to focus on what we
believe are the most fundamental aspects in a
successful implementation of ICT4E, namely
• ICT policies of government and Tertiary
Institutions,
• ICT infrastructure,
• Access and use of ICT for education, and
• Organizations involved in and supporting
Tertiary Institutions

9. 1. ICT policies of government and Tertiary Institutions
According to responses from questionaire:
• there are various legislation that stipulates and encouraged
use of ICT for teaching, learning and research in Nigerian
Tertiary education.
• All the respondents mentioned official documents such as
strategic plans, institutional vision, and action plans for ICT
within their institutions.
• ICT has been part of the referential framework of current
government policies and this has influenced the referential
frameworks of institutions of tertiary education.
• Some of these institutions have very poor ICT
infrastructure, and sometimes lack even a simple website
for information.

10. 2. ICT Infrastructure
Nigeria has made significant progress in terms of ICT infrastructure by liberalizing the
IT Industries, this has made telephone (fixed and mobile) available and affordable
thereby boosting Tele-density from 1% by 2003 to 10% as at 2010.
ISPs were licenced to use diverse facilities to connect to the Internet thereby boosting
bandwidth, which is crucial to down stream information.
The government encouraged and promotes Internet cafés across cities, towns and
villages by reducing drastically the cost of the permit to give more access to the
people at the rural communities.
Internet connectivity are becoming more popular through wireless access protocol
(WAP) in the country, especially with the granting of license to Airtel, MTN, Globacom,
Etisalat and some other mobile telecommunication operators in the country.
However, majority of respondents in this study have poor IT infrastructure. In some
cases, there is only a dial-up connection via a modem, a small server with some hubs,
and a small LAN to distribute Internet access to a computer room, management rooms
and lecturers’ rooms.
In some institutions, the lecturers and students use the same computer room.

11. 3. Access and Use of ICT in Education
The benefits of ICTs for students can only be achieved if the institutions ensure access
for all stakeholders and its use in teaching and learning, research and management.
a) Institutional websites provide important information that can form the basis
for quality ranking of Tertiary Institutions. Judging from the questionnaire responses
majority of the institutions in this study has websites.
 one of these institutions reported that their website was under construction.
 The currently available websites range from rudimentary to advanced, depending
on the IT capacity of each institution and/or the frequency of information updates.
 The website of any institution presents the institution as an organization with a
specific vision and describes its faculties or schools and academic programs.
 In some institutions, the website provides other relevant information such as
academic regulations, admission requirements, and the rights and duties of
students and the lecturers. Institutions such as FUNNAB, University of Jos, ABU,
OAU and CU provide more information regarding the faculties, schools and
departments.

12. Access and Use Cont’d
• A few institutions included news about the institutions on their home page. The
news items on the FUNNAB, ABU and UI site included text, images and some short
videos.
• Institutions like FUNNAB, ABU, OAU, UNILAG and University of Jos have libraries
accessible online
• FUNNAB and University of Jos shared some education materials, such as
courseware for download.
b) According to the questionnaire responses all the institutions, have computer
rooms for lecturers and students.
c) There is a nationwide program involving the Institutions, banks and IT companies
that facilitates donations of furnished ICT centres to these institutions.
• Intercontinental Bank PLC has donated an ICT Centre to AAUA,
• NCC (Nigeria Communication Commission), donated 100 units of laptops to
Adeyemi College of Education,
• NITDA constructed solar powered ICT centres to 6 out of seven public institutions
in the study.
Bandwidth remains problematic and the overwhelming majority of students and
lecturers do not own a computer,
Availability of both Internet access and Internet enabled devices is improving.
Prices have decreased significantly with the emergence of new IT companies and new
tools such as mini-laptops, tablets and mobile phones.
With the new services offered by mobile phone companies, it is now possible to have
Internet access anywhere in the country.

13. 4. Pedagogy
• Documents on Tertiary education in Nigeria spoke of
needing adequate infrastructure, training of lecturers,
using of ICTs for teaching, learning research and
management, and shifting towards student centered
learning to provide a quality education to growing
student enrollments
• Despite government recommendations that student-
centered learning is required by current job market
conditions most of the institutions in this study were
unable to move beyond a rhetorical commitment to
transforming pedagogy.

14. Pedagogy Cont’d
• Across the institutions in this study, teaching in most programs was still
teacher centered
• Notable exceptions including UNILAG, University of Jos, ABU and CU,
which used problem based learning, project oriented learning and
problem oriented learning.
• Use of the Internet as a tool of teaching and learning is still not seen as
desirable by most institutions,
• Few institutions were using a learning management system.
• A blended learning model was in use at UNILAG, FUNNAB, CU and OAU.
• There were also some cases of completely online programs at NOUN and
some completely online courses.
• Some institutions for instance UI Distance Learning Centre, had introduced
distance learning within a blended model, which included short periods of
face-to-face interaction, and the delivery of study materials to resource
centers in the form of CDs and various electronic devices and storage
media.

15. Organizations involved in and supporting
Tertiary Education in Nigeria
• operating and investment budgets of public tertiary
institution of learning were funded by the national
budget through the National University Commission
• funds from donors
• Multilateral financial support on literature acquisition,
research funding, scholarships for lecturers, and
various kinds of equipment including ICT
• New model of funding and support for both public and
private institutions in the form of TETfund
• Other agencies including NCC, NITDA
• Owners of Privately owned institutions

16. Challenges and Limitations
According to the ICT strategic objectives for Tertiary institutions in
Nigeria the major concerns of government were:
• expansion,
• quality improvement and
• increasing access to higher education.
• Some tertiary institutions still have inadequate infrastructure and
need to improve their technical capacity by training lecturers,
researchers and technical staff in the effective use of ICT within
their jobs.
• There is also a need to creatively embed the use of appropriate and
cost effective technologies within tertiary education system
throughout the country.
For effective implementation, some institutions still need to design
action plans that require the use of ICT as a key tool for teaching and
learning.

17. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
• The results show that Nigeria government policies encourage all Tertiary Institutions to
address ICT as a key issue for teaching and learning;
• There are still several persistent constraints for the implementation of ICT in tertiary
education.
• This study highlights some relevant issues that may help the government and Tertiary
Institutions to implement and integrate ICT, as well as to reach some objectives of ICT policy
in Nigerian tertiary education system.
• The results show that ICT is part of strategic plans of all Tertiary Institutions, but in practice it
is still not used effectively in education.
• Some Tertiary Institutions have developed ICT programs and ICT courses in other programs;
however, there remain several Institutions that have a strategic plan but lack a clear action
plan for ICT implementation.
• Even though the government provides funding for quality improvements, innovation and ICT
capacity building there are some institutions that have various difficulties to access this fund
as a result of bureaucracy involved. Nigeria government has made major progress in rolling
out telecommunication infrastructure.
• The government has broken the monopoly of Nigeria Telecommunication Limited (NITEL) by
privatizing the sector thereby increasing the infrastructure, the telecommunication
infrastructure covers all major cities and the villages.
• However, there is still a need to expand the infrastructure to more remote areas.

18. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
• Electricity is not available in parts of the country.
• Most Tertiary Institutions benefitted from funding by the government through TETFund
and/or private companies and international development agencies have also contributed
substantially to the ICT infrastructure capacity building in the country.
• Student-centered approaches are part of strategic change plans for many Tertiary
Institutions, but all institutions are still using teacher-centered approaches. The introduction
of distance education using online or blended learning in a few institutions demonstrates
that there are efforts to increase access and to make use of innovative pedagogy.
• In conclusion, the Nigerian Tertiary Institutions are still far from meeting the objectives
stated in the official “ICT Policy” and “The Mandate of NUC.” Programs to provide ICT
facilities to students by NCC and NITDA have also increased access to the Internet.
• Despite the improved ICT4E adoption showed in this study, there is a need for more
intervention by the government and innovation by Tertiary Institutions in order to achieve
successful integration of ICT in Education in Nigeria. This emphasizes the importance of the
quality assurance role played by the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology.
• Lecturers from all academic disciplines need access to training in a wider range of ICT
competencies and pedagogical flexibility to use tools like Learning Management Systems and
confidently apply innovative pedagogies within blended and online models.
• All institutions must be encouraged to have a strategic plan that includes ICTs that support
innovative pedagogies.
• The government should continue to support the use of ICT in Tertiary Education to achieve
the objectives of the national ICT Policy and higher education policy.