Teachers’ Perceptions, Challenges, and Engagement in Digital Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) in Ghanaian Public Senior High Schools

Abstract

This study examined senior high school (SHS) teachers’ perceptions of digital professional learning communities (DPLCs) in Ghana. A self-administered online questionnaire was used to conduct a cross-sectional descriptive survey with 76 SHS teachers in the Central Region of Ghana. Three internally reliable Likert-type subscales comprised the instrument: willingness to participate in future DPLCs (7 items, ? =.87), perceived challenges (6 items, ? =.70), and perceived benefits (8 items, ? =.88). Data collected were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics with the help of SPSS. The results revealed that the teachers perceived DPLCs to be highly beneficial, particularly in improving access to expert colleagues, saving travel time, enhancing flexible scheduling and enabling reflective collaboration through recorded sessions, while unstable internet connectivity, time constraints and inadequate training were identified as major challenges. The results also revealed strong positive correlation between perceived benefit and willingness to participate in future DPLCs (r =.54) and moderate negative correlations between perceived challenges and perceived benefit (r =- .42) and perceived challenges and willingness to participate in future DPLCs (r = –.36). When the groups were compared, male teachers reported significantly greater perceived benefits than female teachers (p = .02). Furthermore, teachers in the rural areas significantly reported facing more challenges than those in urban areas (p = .007). However, no notable differences were found based on teaching experience or subjects taught. These results underscore the need to improve digital infrastructure, offer targeted training, and adopt hybrid PLC models to ensure equitable professional learning across diverse educational contexts in Ghana.