Analysis of students with and without disabilities in an e-learning setting

Abstract

The Internet and ultimately websites should be accessible and usable so that they can provide timely and accurate information in an effective, efficient and satisfactory way. Accessible and usable websites will help with academic activities, such as accessing study material or contacting lecturers and other teaching and learning processes, that are challenging to accomplish at an ODeL (open distance learning) institution. This paper examines and reports on the average time taken by groups of students with and without disabilities to complete certain tasks, using the University of South Africa (Unisa) website and myUnisa, the e-learning website of Unisa. The people for whom a website is intended, in this case, students with disabilities, have to be involved in the development of the websites, that is the e-learning websites. In this qualitative study, quantitative data analysis is used to support qualitative data analysis. The findings of this study show that groups of participants or students with disabilities are having problems working on this e-learning website. The study endorses that well-developed e-learning platforms must be efficiently, effectively and satisfactorily used by all students, including those with disabilities. The study recommends that it is significant for all the applicable stakeholders to be part of the development of websites to guarantee that accessibility and usability are appropriately adhered to. The intention is to reduce marginalisation, as well as digital and social divides of students with disabilities. In order to obtain improved learning accomplishments, technologies such as the Internet should be used.