Accessibility to the internet

Survey questions How would you rate the level of accessibility to the internet off by VC to students? What method do you use the most to connect to the internet (on campus)? How would you rate your level of skill when using the internet (technology to connect to the internet)? Do you have easy access to the internet at home? Is there satisfactory infrastructure in the area you live in to allow for easy and free access to the internet eg Wifi- hotspots?

Survey Graphs How would you rate the level of accessibility to the internet off by VC to students? Answer Number of students Excellent 12 Good 18 Moderate 3 Poor

What method do you use the most to connect to the internet (on campus)? Answer Number of students Computers at the library 10 Wifi connection (using your own laptops, devices, etc 17 Mobile devices using your own data 6

How would you rate your level of skill when using the internet (technology to connect to the internet)? Answer Number of students Excellent 2 Good 14 Moderate 17 Poor

Do you have easy access to the internet at home? Answer Number of students Yes 24 No 9

Is there satisfactory infrastructure in the area you live in to allow for easy and free access to the internet eg Wifi- hotspots? Answer Number of students Yes 7 No 26

Feedback The survey showed that there is a high level of accessibility offered by VC to the students. Most students rated the level of accessibility as excellent and good (12 and 18 out of 33 respectively). Most of the students (17 out of 33) utilized the Wifi connection offered by the school to connect to the internet using their own laptops, devices etc. A high number of students (10 out of 33) utilized the computers at the library and this also supports the notion of high accessibility offered by VC. A low of 6 out of 33 students mostly use their own data to connect to the internet. When it comes to access to the internet outside of campus most but not all students had easy access to the internet. A majority of 24 of the 33 students had easy access at home. The students had access through their home wifi-routers and data purchased on their mobile devices. One of the common reasons given by the 9 students who didn’t have easy access to the internet at home was that they didn’t have wifi-routers at home and sometimes they couldn’t afford to purchase sufficient data on their mobile devices to do their school work.

An overwhelming 26 of the 33 students answered no when asked if they thought the area they live in has adequate infrastructure to offer free and easy access to the internet through measures such as wifi hotspots. This shows that socio- economic factors can play a role in having accessibility to the internet. If the infrastructure was more developed there would be more free hotspots and etc thus improving accessibility. It is essential to note that the government is slowly trying to tackle this issue through the roll out of initiatives such as Tshwane Wifi.

When it comes to level of skill in using technology the level is relatively of a decent standard, 17 of the 33 students rated their level of skill as moderate, 14 students rated it as good and 2 as excellent. None of the students rated it as poor and this shows that the level of skill is generally adequate even though it is not at the same level for all of the students. There is definitely a correlation between the level of access available and skills. Since there is a high level of accessibility there will b a decent and high level of skills because the accessibility allows students to hone their skills as well as develop and improve their skills.