CHALLENGES FACED BY BSW STUDENTS IN DISTANCE EDUCATION AMID THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

This study aims to identify the difficulties encountered by BSW students through distance education in Turkey during the Covid-19 pandemic and to understand the effects of distance education. The findings of the study show that (n=756) 54% of the students have a computer and 54,4% have internet access. However, the study also found that 12,8% of the participants stated that they did not have computer access, and 3,4% stated that they did not have internet access, and they thought that access problems would reduce their academic success. It was found that 73,9% of the participants found distance education less efficient than face-to-face education; 79,2% needed face-to-face education; 75,9% complained about infrastructure problems, and 73,5% complained about difficulty in focusing. 84,3% of the participants believed that distance education could not create environments such as friendship gained through face-to-face education, 60,4% reported that they learned more stress and exhaustion during distance education, and 47,8% reported that they forgot what they learned through distance education. In addition, in the study, it was determined that there was a significant difference between the participants' grade level and their concerns about negative events to be experienced in distance education, and between their grade point averages and feelings lonely in the distance education process. Among the participants who did not have a special field of study during the distance education process, 48.1% reported that they had problems in home/family relationships during the distance social work education process. These findings showed that the continuation of social work education through distance education during the pandemic period had various effects on BSW students, and recommendations were developed in this direction.