Information technologies field students survey about distance learning

The majority of schools and faculties switched to distance learning in the COVID pandemic period. The goal of the research presented in this paper was to investigate whether the barriers, cons and pros of distance learning might vary between different regions and disciplines. In this paper, we analyzed barriers to the application of distance learning models in the information technologies field. The research was based on a survey organized at two secondary schools specialized for informatics and three different information technologies study programs at Serbian faculties. In total, 175 students participated in an online survey, 102 from secondary schools and 73 from different levels of faculties (bachelor and master studies). This research revealed that technical barriers almost do not exist in the field of information technologies education. Students, as well as teachers from this field have at their disposal satisfactory technical equipment and skills for application of distance learning. However, there are typical problems of distance learning independent of the education field such as lack of student motivation and self-discipline, missing interactions, etc. The level of influence of these negative aspects of distance learning depends on the personality of the student and the cultural characteristics of a particular region, but this research has shown that it also depends on the age and maturity of the students as well.