The Perceptions of Tourism Students Towards Blended Learning: A Case From a Comprehensive University in South Africa

Abstract

This paper explores tourism students’ perceptions of blended learning (BL) and examines the correlations between BL statements, student academic performance (AP), and the level of satisfaction with blended courses (BCs). A questionnaire survey was used to collect data from 166 randomly selected tourism students in a comprehensive University in South Africa. For data analysis, IBM SPSS Statistics 29.0 (IBM Corporation, 2022) software was used. The results indicate that most tourism students had positive perceptions of BL based on their degrees of AP and satisfaction with the BC. Most tourism students claim that they are not comfortable completing assignments and taking assessments online. The results further reveal that students they are frequently disappointed with the assessment approach of online discussions. The study recommends that the university studied conduct a variety of reform programmes geared at strengthening tourism lecturers’ BL abilities (such as upgrading online assessment methodologies and lecture design). To encourage learning involvement, tourism lecturers could improve students’ perceptions of the BL platform in their instructional design. This will gradually improve tourism students’ low perceptions of BL, as identified in this study.