E-learning offered in Malaysian universities: Pros and Cons from the students perspective

E-learning is an essential for network-enabled transfer of skills and knowledge. It is a type of Technology supported education or learning which using the internet or an intranet/extranet, audio or video tape, satellite TV, and CD-ROM to deliver the content. E-learning applications and processes includes web-based learning, computer-based learning, virtual classrooms and digital collaboration. E-learning was first called "Internet-Based training" then "Web-Based Training".

Universiti Teknologu Malaysia (Technological University of Malaysia) is the oldest public engineering and technology university in Malaysia. Before this, in year (1904-1941) it was named as Technical School , in year (1942-1945) was named as Shihan Gakko, in year (1955-1971) was named as Technical College, in year (1971-1975) was named as Institut Teknologi Kebangsaan. After having a long times journey, finally the university was completed and became Universiti teknologi Malaya (UTM) on the 1st of April 1975. UTM main campus was in Skudai, Johor and the branch campuses was in Kuala Lumpur. UTM provide various types of education program, and focus in technical studies, with separate faculties for Education, Pure Sciences, Management, and HRD. The major source of graduate engineers and similar professionals are come from UTM. Since year 1990, the number of foreign students which from Asian countries, Middle East, and Africa, has been increasing. Most of the UTM graduates have involved themselves on many academic and professional institutions across the world. UTM vision is to be a worlds class university by the year of 2010.

On the other hands, UTM was providing e-Learning for the studies. E-learning in UTM can be defined as “the application of ICT to advance the effectiveness of the learning process” (UTM, 2005). By using this system, course content, lecture notes, communication tools, quizzes, tests and assignments can be accessed through the university computer network.

The pros of E-learning
1. No time and far distance spent to travelling to campus – Students of the university came from the whole state and whole country of Malaysia, the campus are very far for some student to come and attend class. Besides, some students need to work so they don’t have much time to spend to go campus study. With the e-learning, student no need spent many time and travel long distance to go campus but can study through access the university network easily and efficietly.

2. All Student is 100 treated fair and equal – By learning through the web, our work will stand merit alone, and we not be treated differently based upon race, sex, creed, sexual orientation, religion and disability.

3. Additional benefits of learning through E-learning – Study by using e-learning can provide students learning new technologies and practicing the use of the internet, office software and having more knowledge in IT than other face to face lecture’s student.

The cons of E-learning
1. Lack of face-to face interaction – By study using e-learning, student and lecturer seldom meet each other. This happen especially in self-paced course. So it was difficult in developing the relationship with classmate.

2. Expensive study’s equipments are requite – By study through internet, student need to spent a large amount to buy the personal laptop or pc, licensed office software and internet online. It will increased the financial burden of the parent.

3. Self-motivated and disciplined are important – Without face to face interaction, student must be more self-motivated and disciplined to progress through their program in a timely manner. If not, student will getting more and more lazy and get worse on their studies.


Further sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universiti_Teknologi_Malaysia
http://www.elearners.com/resources/elearning-faq5.asp
http://eprints.utm.my/5948/1/e_Learning_Implementation_in_Malaysian_Universities_The_UTM_Experience.pdf