This study centers on a retrospective investigation of effective and pedagogic planning of academic digital courses taught during the COVID-19 crisis, from the students’ perspective. We shall focus on the difference between the traditional, teaching-centered paradigm, and the modern learning-centered approach, while emphasizing the formulation of learning outcomes in online study expanses, in light of the learning experience imposed on teachers and students at the various academic institutions.The study explored the learning outcomes from students’ point of view, as well as the benefits and challenges embodied by formulating learning goals in the post-COVID era, according to the learning-centered paradigm, relating to the strengths and weaknesses of the Zoom teaching method from the students’ perspective, predicated on 1,828 students from several institutions. We used a mixed methods design incorporating qualitative and quantitative analysis to develop the Online Teaching Recommendations (SOTR) model. We used Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) for goodness-of-fit.The research findings indicate that the various types of e-learning challenge academic institutions to carry out renewed thinking about the main potential advantage of physical academic institutions where students and teachers meet, talk, and discuss directly and unmediated, compared to virtual bodies of knowledge and teaching that are evolving at present and that are allegedly threatening to render universities irrelevant.