Application Of Ict In Service Delivery In Public Universities In Kenya. A Case Of Kenyatta University, Kenya

Information Technology (IT) is said to be the technology of 21st century. There has been a huge growth in the field of information technology.  Traditionally IT was used only to provide the back office support to organizations. Nowadays it plays a strategic role in organizations supporting many business functions and also shapes new strategies in organizations. The IT field has also been introduced in the field of governance called “EGovernance”. This IT based E- governance has also been introduced in the field of education. The implementation of e -governance in education has led to new broader innovations. E-governance has enabled universities to expand their current geographical reach, to interact to prospective students all over the world and to establish themselves as global education providers. The process has greatly transformed service delivery and enhanced efficiency in public universities. This study was guided by the following objectives; Find out the extent in which e-governance has transformed service delivery in public universities in Kenya, Establish the status of accessibility and equity in egovernance service delivery in public universities in Kenya, Find out the status of resources used in e-governance programme of service delivery in public universities, Identify the challenges of e-governance in public universities and their mitigation strategies. A case study design was used for this study. The target population of the study was 61946 university students 10 heads of departments who were purposively selected from the 14 schools in the University and 5 I.T officers from the I.T department; however for need of accuracy of data collected the sample size to be used for the study was randomly selected whereby Fresher’s formulae of calculating sample size was used to determine a sample size of 196 3rd year students from 5 randomly selected schools in the universities who participated in the study. The research instruments for the study were questionnaires for students and interview schedules for heads of departments and I.T officers. Descriptive survey was used for data collection and SPSS analysis programme was used to perform descriptive analysis. Data were presented in descriptive form supported by means, tables, frequency, distributions and percentages. Hence service delivery in the institution still remained to be uncreative due to underutilization of the resources.  The institution was not fully equipped with all basic ICT resources necessary for effective service delivery within the institution. It was found that accessibility to egovernance-based services was average. The study concludes that the investment in ICT has a significant positive influence on the service delivery. Unless ICT literacy is improved through in-service training with the institution, the quality of service delivery remains low even if all the ICT facilities are procured by the institutions. Adequacy is not only a contributing factor to implementations, but also skills and knowledge on ICT  based on application of new technologies, innovated soft wares and applications. The study recommends that the institutions invest more in information technology so as to improve on the current ICT situation in the universities and increase the countries competitiveness, productivity and growth through investment in information technology. The study findings may draw light into possibilities of collaboration across universities throughout the nation and region in the development and implementation of digital initiatives in delivering services in Universities and Colleges.