Faculty’s Usage of Academic Support ICT Services at Kuwait University

Abstract

This study aimed to identify the degree of usage by Kuwait University (KU) faculty members of the academic support information and communication technology (ICT) tools, services, systems, and resources provided by KU. The study comprised an exploratory descriptive research design, using a survey questionnaire technique. A total of 304 faculty members willingly participated in the study. Regardless of two decades of massive investment to situate ICT tools, services, systems, and resources as a pivotal tenet of KU’s teaching, learning, research, and administration practices, the findings revealed that formal academic usage of these ICT services and resources by KU faculty is only “average” (overall mean score is 3.48 (SD = 0.937) on a 6-point rating scale). This implies that the potential benefits of these academic support ICT systems and services have not yet been attained, in terms of serving KU’s strategic objectives. Lack of technical support, awareness of availability, time, knowledge/training, and impracticality (e.g., difficulty accessing ICT services and resources due to slow speed connection, or too much maintenance, etc.) were among the key factors that led KU faculty members either to not use at all or to infrequently use academic support ICT services and resources provided by KU. In light of these findings, a number of important implications are provided to help increase the extent of ICT tools and resource usage by KU faculty members. Other academic institutions can use this study as a reference to evaluate their faculty members’ ICT use.