Strategic Barriers in the Effective Integration of ICT in the

Public Schools of Pakistan

Shafaq Salam Zeng Jianqiu Zulfiqar Hussain Pathan
School of Economics and School of Economics and School of Economics and
Management Management Management
Beijing University of Posts and Beijing University of Posts and Beijing University of Posts and
Telecommunication, China Telecommunication, China Telecommunication, China
+86 18811796569 13718688489@139.com +8615624962430
shafaqsalam@yahoo.com Zulfi2k3bcs@yahoo.com
Wang Lei
School of Economics and
Management
Beijing University of Posts and
Telecommunication, China
18810771076@139.com
ABSTRACT Communication Technologies (ICT). Although, use of ICT is
With the commencement of Information and communication equitable important in all organizations, however, it is considered
Technology (ICT) in the globalized economy, contemporary life as the mainstay of the education system. Quality education is vital
is dominated by the utilization of technologies. Therefore, many for the knowledge societies and digital economies. ICT has the
countries are striving hard to incorporate ICT in all facets of life potential to bring about educational reform. For this purpose,
especially in education. Developing countries like Pakistan are many countries are allocating substantial amount of budget for the
facing challenges in the implementation of ICT in public schools. integration of ICT in education system. But, for the developing
The foremost purpose of this study is to investigate the strategic countries, it is a great challenge to allocate substantial amount for
barriers that hamper the use of ICT in public schools of Khyber education sector because of other challenges like poverty, food
Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan. For this purpose, a survey was and developmental projects. Among these developing countries,
conducted in the Education Department of KP province and Pakistan is also facing challenges to compete well in the digital
questionnaires were filled by the education officers. Results of the economy because of the lack of technological competent
study indicate that dearth of funds for education sector impede the workforce.
effective implementation of ICT in public schools. Moreover,
expenditure of hardware/software, obsolete curriculum,
1.1 Purpose of the Study
malfunction of power supply/ internet connection, and lack of ICT In developing countries, ICTs are the effective way to improve the
based teachers’ training are the major barriers that obstruct the life standard of the people by producing digital workforce. ICT is
integration of ICT in public schools. Findings of the study will being practiced in the private schools of Pakistan in teaching and
help policy makers and education officers to take necessary learning effectively while public schools are deprived of such
measures for the provision of ICT resources in the public schools facilities. The foremost purpose of this study is to highlight the
of KP province (Pakistan). strategic barriers comprised of policy, budget, curricula and
teachers training, in a multifaceted and tactical way so as to
CCS Concepts facilitate the process of the implementation of ICT in the public
General and reference ➝ General conference proceedings schools of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan.

Keywords 2. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

ICT; education policy; budget; curricula; teachers’ training There are number of barriers that are hindering the effective
implementation of ICT in education sector. Previous studies
1. INTRODUCTION conducted by various scholars have focused numerous factors.
In the era of digital technologies, societies, organizations and Cost of infrastructure, electricity issues, teachers’ skills and
individuals are becoming customary of the Information and leadership are the main barriers that affect the implementation
process [1]. While comparing the ICT in education policy in Chile
and South Africa, access to ICT resources, support to teachers,
opportunities of professional development of teachers, didactic
vision of school principals and teaching and learning practices are
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for some of the key challenges faced by South African government
personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are [2]. Challenges faced by developing countries are poor
not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that governance, dearth of budget for education, overcrowded
copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy classrooms, medium of instruction and no action plan for the
otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, implementation of policy [3]. Lack of inadequate digital
requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. infrastructure is a key barrier in the implementation of ICT in
CSAI 2017, December 5–7, 2017, Jakarta, Indonesia schools. Availability of hardware/software, electricity and internet
© 2017 Association for Computing Machinery.
issues are the key challenges in using ICT in classrooms [4].
ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-5392-2/17/12…$15.00
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3168390.3168422

169
An important key factor hindering the successful implementation ICT POLICY

of ICT in schools is the well-defined educational policy and • Low Budget for ICT resources
• No Implementation of ICT policy
planning especially depicting the ICT implementation. Systematic • Lack of interest of Government

Integration of ICT in Public School Education System

implementation of ICT depends on educational policy makers’
perception and vision towards the use of ICT in school culture [3,
5]. Educational policies should include mechanism for
encouragement and remuneration the teachers’ use of ICT in COST OF ICT RESOURCES

classes and it should be the part of professional development of • High cost of ICT hardware/software
• Maintenance cost
teachers [6]. Provision of physical facilities is also another • Absence of IT Labs / Coordinators

hindrance in the implementation of ICT. Among these physical

Strategic Barriers
facilities are the IT laboratories, heating and cooling system,
ventilators and furniture. Before implementing ICT, adequate CURRICULUM
physical infrastructure must be in proper place [7]. Adequate • Out dated curriculum
• Medium of Instruction
provision of technical resources like software and hardware is • Computer as a Subject

another barrier to equip public schools with these resources to

support curriculum delivery. The major challenge is to develop
software according to the local educational requirements for ELECTRICITY & INTERNET
teaching and learning in public schools [8]. Access to electricity • Power Supply issues
and internet is fundamental for communal services like health and •
•
Internet issues
High cost of electricity
education and impacts the development and economic growth of
the developing countries. High cost of electricity and internet
access is a serious impediment to the integration of ICT in public TEACHER’S TRAINING
schools of the developing countries [9]. • Lack of ICT based teacher training
• Lack of professional development of in
service teachers
ICT skills and knowledge and ongoing professional development • Cost of arranging ICT programs for in
service teachers
of teachers play a significant role in the use of ICT tools in
schools. Teachers’ beliefs and attitude, technological skills and Figure 1. Conceptual Model for the effective implementation
knowledge are vital for using ICT in teaching practices [8]. of ICT.
Unfortunately, many developing countries like Africa, lack these
ICT based training programs for teachers [10]. Curricula and
medium of instruction are also main barriers in the effective 4. METHODOLOGY
implementation of ICT. In the developing countries of the world, As mentioned earlier, without the presence of concrete rationale
there is a prominent difference in the curricula and medium of and an effective policy, ICT implementation is not possible in
instruction in public and private schools, resulting in the education sector. For this purpose, this research study was carried
inequitable quality of education to the citizens of these countries. out in the Education Department of KP Province of Pakistan to
This results in the digital divide and social discrimination among explore the key challenges faced by the education officials for not
the citizens. Researches show that 80% of software and online providing the ICT resources in the public schools of KP Province.
contents are in English. This is a serious barrier for countries A five point Likert Scale questionnaire was designed having range
where English is not the first language like India and Pakistan 1-5, 1= Strongly Agree, 2= Agree, 3= neutral, 4=Disagree and 5=
[11]. This limits the access for people who are not fluent in Strongly Disagree. There were total 40 educational officials
English. Implementation of ICT requires large capital investment. responsible for the rehabilitation and maintenance work of public
Due to financial constraints, governments of developing countries schools of the province and among the whole population
spend the major amount of the educational budget for the questionnaires were distributed and 20 filled questionnaires were
rehabilitation and maintenance of school buildings and teachers’ received back, therefore the total response rate remained 50% .
salaries. Therefore, ICT for education is not yet considered a
priority. In general, sustainable and effective implementation of 5. FINDINGS
ICT in education requires provision of adequate infrastructural Reliability of data was calculated first for finding out the validity
facilities, access to technologies and their intermittent revisal, and of the data.
professional development support for teachers [9].
Table 1. Reliability statistics
3. CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
Adequate rationale is pertinent for the successful implementation Variables Cronbach's Alpha N of Items
of ICT in education. Education is a vital investment for the
ICT Policy .867 3
economic development of the country. An educational policy
cannot be prepared without the societal, political and government Cost of Hardware/Software .715 3
configurations. Constitution of Pakistan commends the state with
the liability of providing equal and quality education to all the Curriculum .980 3
residents of the country. Poor governance, inaccessibility to ICT
Electricity/Internet issues .877 3
resources and implementation gap because of political pressure
and favoritism are believed to hamper the stipulation of human Teachers’ Training .860 3
and capital resources to the public schools. Figure 1 presents the
conceptual model of the study. Integration of ICT .877 3
Overall Reliability of Data .862 18

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Table 1 show the Reliability Statistics that provides the value for successful implementation of ICT means the efficient use of these
Cronbach’s alpha which in this case being calculated as 0.862 and resources by the teachers in their teaching practices. However,
it reflects high reliability of the measuring variables. It indicates public schools’ teachers are not ICT based trained teachers and
high level of internal consistency among the all items of variables there is no opportunity for these teachers to obtain the ICT based
with respect to the specific sample. training offered by the education department. Majority of
respondents with mean value 3.1 and SD value 0.61 were agreed
Table 2. Descriptive statistics that teacher training institutes lack the ICT based training
programs for teachers. And it is expensive for the education
Variables N Mean Std. Deviation department to organize such type of training programs for all in-
ICT Policy 20 3.1667 .62595 service teachers of public schools.

Cost of Hardware/Software 20 3.5167 .43896

Curriculum 20 3.3500 .72123
Electricity/Internet issues 20 3.5500 .65136 90
Teachers’ Training 20 3.1667 .62595 80

Integration of ICT 20 3.5500 .65136 65 65

Percentage
Valid N 20 55

Respondents of education department were asked to fill the

questionnaire by indicating the level of agreement against the
various variables. The collected data was analyzed through SPSS,
mean and standard deviations were computed.
The average value of mean of the ICT policy variable was 3.1 and
standard deviation was 0.62. This indicates that education officials
were strongly agreed that there is inconsiderable amount of

Curriculu
/ Software

Electercity
ICT Policy

Teacher's
/ Internet
hardware

Training
budget for education sector; moreover, government is less

Cost of

Issue
m
interested in providing ICT resources to the public schools as
mentioned in the education policy. Apart from this, no action plan
has been taken yet for the provision of ICT resources in all public
schools of the province as shown in Table 2.
Figure 2. Barriers to the integration of ICT in education.
Cost of hardware and software was another major obstacle in the
implementation of ICT as the mean value for this variable was 3.5
with standard deviation 0.43. Participants had the same opinion Figure 2 indicates the magnitude of the barriers to the effective
that the allocated education budget is not sufficient for the implementation of ICT in education. Participant’s response for the
stipulation of ICT resources. Moreover, it is intricate for the concrete policy and appropriate budget was total ranked and
government to bear the cost of maintenance of ICT resources in calculated as 90%, this shows that this variable is more critical
the limited budget. The reality is that most of the public schools and without the substantial amount of funds and comprehensible
are deprived of the computer laborites and IT coordinators. objectives, efficient action plan is not possible. Moreover,
A premeditated curriculum coupled with internationally spoken education reform needs a solid change in curriculum and medium
language is indispensable for the knowledge construction of the of instruction according to the international standard as 80% of
students with the help of using ICT in teaching and learning. respondents were agreed on it. Henceforth, 65% of the
However, majority of the educational officials responded this participants were agreed that ICT resources are expensive,
variable with mean value 3.3 and standard deviation .72, this moreover, ICT based training is imperative for the in service
elaborates that the public schools’ curriculum is outdated and teachers, for the effective and efficient implementation of ICT. So
medium of instruction is also Urdu or the local languages. Apart far, 55% of participants were of the view that constant and stable
from this, in limited public high schools, computer science is supply of electricity and smooth internet connection are necessary
taught as an optional subject. Conversely, all the primary schools for the efficient delivery of lessons in classes.
and other high schools are deprived of such facilities.
Stable supply of electricity and access to internet is another 6. CONCLUSION
challenge in the implementation of ICT in schools. The
A concrete vision and an effective policy and planning are
participants’ response towards this problem was positive with
fundamental for the successful implementation of ICT in public
mean value 3.5 and SD value was 0 .65. Although in urban areas
schools of Pakistan. However, the reality is that a great deal of
electricity and internet issue is not high but in the remote areas of
teaching and learning as well as administrative tasks are carried
the province this problem exacerbates. Cost of electricity and
out manually. Dearth of funds for education sector is a great
internet is also an issue for the government to compensate in the
hurdle in taking necessary steps for education reform with respect
limited budget.
to the use of ICT. Another major obstacle is the outdated curricula
Allocation of ICT resources in the public school is not the that are not according to the international standard. Moreover,
legitimate implementation of ICT in true sense; rather the software and online contents are available in English. Conversely,

171
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