Measures to Enhance Student Learning and Well-Being during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Perspectives of Students from a Historically Disadvantaged University

Reviewer 1

Comment

Remarks

Page no

The flaw of the paper is the poorness of bibliography about distance teaching: there are recent studies about the topic, also published in the Education Sciences, especially set in Europe and USA. I suggest that at least these studies are cited in the paper, in such a way the bibliography could be enriched, comparing the situation of rural African Universities with European and American ones. 

This is a good observation by the reviewer. We have revised the background as per the suggestion to strengthen this area.

Refer to page 2-3 under the background section.

 It is not clear which were the question posed in the questionnaire. Please provide the questions in the “Materials and Methods” section.

Questions which were asked to elicit responses are now integrated under item 2.2.

Refer to page 4 under the item on “Population and data collection”

 You talk about “students and personnel” (line 81) as the target of the study, but it seems that you analyse only students’ answers. Please clarify the matter.

The sentence has been revised to offer clarity, i.e., for this report we only analysed and presented data collected from the student sub-population. To have presented both the student and staff data in one paper would have convoluted it. Data from the staff has also been analysed and reported separately.

Refer to page 3, line 126-128 read together with line 135-136.

 In the “Results and Discussion” section, in every subsection related to a category of answers, you often use “a majority of students” or “students suggested”, etc … but you don’t specify the percentage of students involved in that category of answers. Please provide percentages.

The comment is noted. We have since dealt away with such expressions. Furthermore, we have added some figures to help with percentages of responses to closed ended questions to enhance the study findings.

Refer to pages 16 for the figures and interpretations.

 In the “References” section, references should be numerated [1], [2], etc … as recalled in the text.

This omission has been rectify.

Refer to the reference list section.

You often use “gadget” for technological device, I think that the word “device” is more appropriated, but, anyway, I’m not native speaker, so just consider the opportunity to change it.

Comment noted, everywhere were ICT gadget/s was used it has been replaced with ICT devices

All areas are highlighted in red on various pages

 I don’t like the repetition of the word “based” in lines 79 and 80. Consider to review the sentence.

Sentence reviewed.

See first line under item 2, on page 16.

 In table 1, line 5, you should fix the indentation of “Rural” and “74”.

Table 1 formatting has been revised for consistency.

See table formatting changes on page 5

 I think there is a typo in line 188, because you write “process and teaching and learning”. I think you meant “process of teaching and learning”.

Noted and corrected.

Refer to page 16, now starting from line 273

In line 238, please replace “corona” with “coronavirus”.

Addressed throughout the entire document

 In line 290 a full stop is required after [12, 7].

Inserted

Reviewer 2

Comment

Remarks

Page no

Author/authors used the term strategies, but I have an objection on this word, because the results focus on deficits/proposals more than strategies. And, because of that, paper looses its dynamics.

To satisfy this observation we revised the title from “strategies” to “measures”, and anywhere else in the body were such a phrase was used for consistency.

See on the title page.

 I suggest authors to elaborate more on the data collected.

This comment has been addressed under item 2.2

See highlighted on page 4 under item on “Population and data collection”.

Reviewer 3

Comment

Remarks

Page no

-I wonder how big is the student community in South Africa? Has the government taken all these concerns into account and lifted student restrictions or have campuses opened?

We mad an attempt to address some of the reviewer’s reflective comments under the item on study site. The background now also reflects better on the South African situation.

See on page 3-4 under item 2.1

Also see line 52-54

The text requires few editorial corrections:

- page 7 there should be a dot after footnote [12, 7],

- page 8 after the footnote [24, 27] - remove double spaces,

- page 12 - table - masks - not "musk",

- In the table on pages 9-13, a quotation mark should be added next to each respondent's answer.

Identified editorials have been addressed.

For quick reference, all changes are highlighted in red on the respective pages.