Vice-Chancellors Influence on Academic Staff Intentions to Use Learning Management Systems

Abstract

Universities world over are increasingly deploying learning management systems to enhance the quality of teaching and learning as well as to increase access to higher education. However, since technology rejection is common, the future of universities depends on their instructor's capacity to adopt and diffuse such technologies to meet the intricate needs of the academic masses. Consequently, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors that inhibit or accelerate the adoption and diffusion of Learning Management System (LMS) by academic staff for teaching and learning activities. The paper is based on a questionnaire survey completed by 82 lecturers from a selected sample of public and private universities in Kenya. The results of analysis indicate that Vice Chancellors/Chief Executive Officer (CEO) characteristics, namely:- keenness on modern information communication and technologies (ICTs), Influence on ICTs development, and, visionary ICT leadership are important determinants of LMS adoption and diffusion by instructors in higher education. Further, organizational variables of Subjective norm (SN), availability of ICTs (AICT), Organizational support (OS), Organizational readiness (OR), and top management support (TMS) were related to behavioural intentions to use (BIU) LMS by academic staff for teaching and learning. In addition, in this paper, the technology acceptance model (TAM) was also extended to include VCs/CEO characteristics, and organizational readiness. Results from the research also determined the factor that was dominant in predicting the acceptance of LMS which was top management support. This paper further validated the use of TAM, as a supportive framework for investigating the academic staff intentions to use Learning Management Systems for teaching and learning.