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Reasons not to do an IT course

There was a minority of people who said that they did not want to do an IT course.  This group gave several reasons for their feelings.

Wanting to learn in different ways- Some did not want to learn IT skills through a formal course.  Learning on their own was preferable for some people, or learning informally from family and friends (see how people like to learn about computers).  Peoples’ learning styles, confidence and experiences of learning will probably have influenced their thinking here, and so this reason is linked to the other reasons that people gave for not wanting to go on a course.

Confidence- As suggested above, confidence was another important reason why people did not want to go on an IT course.  For some this might be related to their confidence in going on a course generally.  For others it relates to the fact that many who have no experience with computers are scared of them , feeling that they might damage them.

Irrelevant to their lives-  Some people did not want to do an IT course because they felt that IT skills were not relevant to their lives.    One reason behind this was that they did not feel IT skills would benefit them at home, whilst other reasons were related to the belief that they did not need IT skills for their current job, or for any job that they might have in the future.  Some also felt that they just weren’t interested in computers.

Put off learning- A minority also did not want to be involved in any kind of formal learning due to bad experiences in the past, and this included IT courses.  These bad experiences often dated back to school, and were especially powerful if an individual had done some formal learning after bad school experiences, and had had a bad experience there too, therefore cementing their attitude to learning.