Evaluation of Virtual Educations System from the Viewpoints of Faculty Members and Students in NKUMS during the Pandemic Coronavirus 2019

COVID‑19 pandemic has influenced educational systems across the world including Iranian higher education. To prevent educational disruption in Iranian medical universities, virtual education has been spread, as an alternative to conventional approaches to education. In the present study, the efficacy of the virtual education system in North Khorasan University of Medical Sciences from the viewpoints of faculty members and students has been evaluated.

In this descriptive-analytical study, 115 faculty members and 354 students from different faculties were selected using a stratified random sampling method. Data were collected using a questionnaire with 8 components for evaluating virtual education systems including teaching-learning activities, flexibility, educational content and organization, interaction and feedback, users’ support, workload, and virtual system. Descriptive and analytic statistics were applied to analyze the data using the GraphPad Prism software.

The findings showed that all components of virtual education be semi-desirable (scores were above mean score) from viewpoints of students and faculty members, except the component of interaction and feedback which were desirable (score was lower than the mean score). In addition, a significant difference was found between viewpoints of faculty members and students in all components of virtual education except the virtual education system.

To increase the quality of virtual education, it is suggested to promote interaction and feedback between faculty members and students through making synchronous communication, enabling group learning activities, promoting active learning, and providing immediate feedback throughout the courses.