Exploring the transition to the digital age in higher education teaching

Abstract

The global Covid 19-pandemic led to many challenges for higher education (HE) teachers. However, it also provided an opportunity to not only re-evaluate a previously unquestioned teaching culture, but also to fundamentally question the capabilities of HE institutions and teachers to implement digitally supported education at the organizational, teaching, and learning levels. In this study, we analyzed data from 1,339 HE teachers’ conclusions for post-pandemic teaching terms of instructional course quality. Our findings shed light on HE teachers’ mindsets toward traditional face-to-face and online teaching, as well as (im)probable changes in academic teaching culture. Our results offer a “bottom-up” basis for recommendations on how institutions can support their faculty for digital transformations in HE based on teachers’ expertise and perceptions of the advantages and hindrances of HE online teaching.