Implementation of ICT in Government and Private Higher Secondary Schools in Balangir: A Comparative Study

Abstract

Even though the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is increasing, resource management, along with the institutional context, plays a prominent role in its educational role, resulting in dissimilarities in the digital integration among the schools. The main purpose of this research was to compare the implementation of ICT between government and private higher secondary schools in Balangir block based on four aspects: availability of tools, use, impact on academics, and problems encountered by the students. A descriptive comparative survey design was used for this study. A total of 70 higher secondary students participated, out of which n=35 and n=35 belonged to government and private schools, respectively. Primary data were gathered from the participants through the structured Likert scale questionnaire. Descriptive analyses such as the computation of percentages were utilized to present the pertinent results. Meanwhile, the inferential statistics, which included an independent-samples t-test, were performed to examine the difference between the government and private schools’ students. The results revealed that disparities in the fundamental accessibility to ICT resources such as the computer lab and internet connection were non-existent between the two (2) higher secondary schools. However, there is an apparent variation in relation to the availability of the interactive classroom display. Interestingly, the analysis revealed that there was no significant difference in daily digital activity and technical proficiency between the two (2) higher secondary schools. Furthermore, regardless of the school type, exposure to ICT resulted in a positive disposition towards learning and higher examination scores. Nevertheless, the major difference was found in the problems encountered by the students, in which government school students experienced more problems than private school students. It can be concluded that just placing the ICT tools in the academic environment is not enough to address the needs of the students in the 21st century. It is recommended that instead of acquiring more devices to facilitate learning in government schools, more resources must be allocated to address the issues in relation to the lack of proper teacher orientation and high charges for internet subscription.