A CRITICAL REVIEW ON THE EFFICIENCY AND REGULARITY OF ICT USAGE AMONG BUSINESS EDUCATION STUDENTS

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1BACKGROUND OF STUDY

Business education is crucial to a country's development. For effective educational teaching and learning of business education courses, there must be an adequate supply of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) devices. Information and communication technology (ICT) is a must-have tool in this digital age. To address the difficulties of the information age, the ICT sector is undergoing a paradigm shift. It is also a powerful force that has influenced many aspects of people's life. The impact of ICT on industries such as law, tourism, business, engineering, architecture, and medicine during the last three decades cannot be understated. As a result, the ways in which these sectors operate have altered substantially. Surprisingly, students and lecturers have emerged as the new norm for teaching and learning. To provide optimum teaching and learning in higher education, adequate supplies of ICT tools for both professors and students are required (Desmond 2019). A business education curriculum is required to educate skilled business educators in secondary and higher education, as well as quick thinkers for economic advancement. They went on to argue that educational programs require adequate facilities and equipment. Education regulatory authorities, such as the National Universities Commission (NUC) and the National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE), have proposed a minimum number of facilities for a certain number of students. Meanwhile, several examples have been documented proving the government's willingness to provide outstanding facilities in order to increase performance.

According to Anderson and Glen (2016), ICT nowadays improves technical advantages in accessing, obtaining, changing, and presenting information. Ajisafe described Information and Communication Technology as "any technology used to produce, store, process, and use information in diverse formats to facilitate communication." According to Oluwalola (2018), ICT is a sort of education that gives learners with applicable digital talents, allowing such individuals to contribute productively to social advancement. Today, information and communication technology (ICT) has considerably enhanced both teacher and student performance in both developed and developing countries. According to one study, (90 percent) of European teachers utilize ICT at various levels of school to improve efficacy and student understanding. Despite the importance of ICTs in education, it has been said that lecturers at Nigerian higher education institutions lack the digital skills required to deploy and leverage ICT-based teaching (Agbo 2015). Apkan's research on lecturer efficiency in Nigeria demonstrates a mismatch between the usage of ICT resources and instructors' abilities. As a result, in order to acquire the competencies and abilities required for effective use of technology instructional delivery, business school instructors must be properly educated and retrained (Akpan 2020). Tinio (2002) asserts that ICTs have the potential to enhance access while also improving the relevance and quality of education in developing countries. He went on to argue that ICTs significantly facilitate knowledge acquisition and absorption, giving developing countries an unprecedented chance to strengthen educational institutions, better policy creation and execution, and widen the range of alternatives for businesses and the disadvantaged. As a result, teaching children yesterday's skills and technologies may render them inefficient and unprepared for the world of tomorrow. This is reason enough for ICTs to receive widespread attention and awareness. This indicates the rising need for ICTs in education as well as their growing significance. Because ICTs enable students and teachers to personalize learning and instruction to individual needs, society is putting pressure on schools to respond adequately to technological advancement.

1.2STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

It goes without saying that businesses cannot thrive in the contemporary period without an informed and communicative edge, and business education graduates cannot compete worldwide without ICT skills. It has recently come to the notice of business school stakeholders the invaluable value of ICT tools like as computers, audio-visual equipment, internet access, and so on to the course. They are unsure, however, if this technical possibility is being most efficiently and ideally grasped and explored. According to Ihedika (2019), Communication tools are an essential aspect of company and business education, and their widespread use, particularly in recent years, is progressively being adopted in undergraduate training. However, in many universities  across Nigeria, the majority of institutions are not swiftly implementing ICT resources such as computers and the internet into their programs for student usage. The goal of this study is to assess the efficacy and consistency of ICT use among business education students.

1.3    OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

The broad focus of this study is on a critical review on the efficiency and regularity of ict-use among business education students.

This research is aimed at achieving the following objectives :

i.          To examine whether there is  availability  of ICT tools  in the institutions.

ii.        To explore whether business education students are sufficiently equipped with ICT  tools required to experience genuine academic growth and to be globally competitive.

iii.      To determine the extent to which business education students are using ICT facilities to support their studies in universities

iv.      To establish how students can derive more usefulness from ICT facilities that they are exposed to.

1.4     RESEARCH QUESTIONS

i.          Are there  availability  of ICT tools  in the institutions.

ii.        Are business education students are sufficiently equipped with ICT  tools required to experience genuine academic growth and to be globally competitive.

iii.      Are business education students sufficiently using ICT facilities to support their studies?

iv.      How can business education students derive greater utility from ICT facilities that they have access to?

1.5     SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

 This research will reveal the deficiencies inherent in business education students’ use of ICT technologies.This research will help open the eyes of business education students to the unexplored variety of opportunities that exist in ICT use. This research will also help business education students realize how to increase the influence of ICT on their studies.The findings of this study may hopefully contribute to existing literature by extending the stock of knowledge on effectiveness and regularity of ICT use among business education students. And serve as a reference material to student and scholars who wishes to conduct further studies on related field.

1.6       SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The scope of this study borders on  the effectiveness and regularity of ICT use among business education students. This study will focus primarily on business education students in University of Ilorin, in Kwara State.

1.7       LIMITATION OF THE STUDY

Like in every human endeavour, the researchers encountered slight constraints while carrying out the study. The significant constraint was the scanty literature on the subject owing that it is a new discourse thus the researcher incurred more financial expenses and much time was required in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature, or information and in the process of data collection, which is why the researcher resorted to a limited choice of sample size covering only University of Ilorin, in Kwara State. Thus findings of this study cannot be used for generalization for other  junior schools in other  states within Nigeria. Additionally, the researcher will simultaneously engage in this study with other academic work will impede maximum devotion to the research. Howbeit, despite the constraint encountered during the  research, all factors were downplayed in other to give the best and make the research successful.

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