The Experience of Coping with Distance and Hybrid Learning in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic: the Case of ITMO University Students

The digitalization of education is not a new process for higher education. However, the COVID-19 pandemic and the forced transition to distance learning have accelerated the pace of digital transformation of higher education. In connection with the emergency transition from traditional classroom learning, participants in the educational process faced various difficulties. Even though there are many works on higher education during the COVID-19 period, there is little research on student experience of coping with the challenges posed by the transition to distance and hybrid learning, especially the experience of Russian science and technology students. The purpose of this work is to determine what difficulties senior undergraduate students at ITMO University faced when switching to distance and hybrid learning formats in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and how they coped with them. The study was carried out in a qualitative methodology, the method was a semi-structured interview. As a result of the work, two categories of difficulties were identified and described - directly related to learning (difficulties with adapting to the "new formats" of conducting different types of classes, technical difficulties, problems in communication with the teacher, inconvenient class schedule) and "non-academic" problems with which students could also encounter, regardless of the specifics of their field of study (lack of communication, physical fatigue, loss of concentration, blurring of the boundaries of "home" and "study / work",). The main ways of coping with difficulties were analyzed: seeking social support and help, distraction for rest, sports, relaxation practices, humility with the situation. The results obtained were compared with earlier coping studies. The author identified effective and ineffective ways of coping and analyzed in what situations and for coping with what difficulties these methods were (in)effective.