Sithabile Majola

The Minister of Higher Education and Training, Dr. Blade Nzimande said that there will be online classes for students still at home so that no one is left behind, but that has only caused strain to the first years.

Sanelisiwe Myeza who is a first year student studying Somatology at the Durban University of technology said she was not used to online learning that was provided by the institution.

“Our course is mainly on doing practicals, for us, in Somatology we are nothing without those practicals and we cannot do them online,” said Myeza.

She said the new learning system was too difficult for her because she has a big family and it is always noisy, by the time they settle down at night she experiences network problems because she lives in the rural areas.

“I normally miss my online classes for theory because we have poor network connections at home,” she said.

Nokubonga Makhathani also lives in the rural areas and does not have access to the internet and knows nothing about how online learning works. She said she has so many things she needs to do at home and must still try catching up with online lectures and stay updated.

“My first experience as a university student has been tough, I do hospitality Management and I am supposed to be enjoying my first year in university but now I do not even show up for my online lectures because the network is not working,” said Makhathini.

Makhathini further that  she was disappointed on the techniques used by the government on online learning because most of the things are new to them and some of them are not even used to typing and doing work online.

Picture: Indianexpress.com