Abstract:

Since the late 20th century, specifically the 1990s, the creation and integration of innovation and interactive technologies have become a daily reality in people's lives. These technological tools have been created, adapted, and integrated into several fields, from agriculture to drones or education with virtual learning environments and virtual realities. In the educational field, the creation and inclusion of adaptable, accessible, and appealing environments using artificial intelligence or virtual realities are increasing as leading Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) since it allows a longer service life and therefore a sustainable system. The ICTs have been created to improve the learning process while creating an ecosystem in Higher Education institutions' structures through the teachers' training and education to provide them with the skills required in this Digital Era. Nevertheless, the appearance and spread of the Sars-covid-2 or Covid-19 resulting in the current pandemic has put in check these technologies and the systems created inside Higher Education institutions. Based on the need created, these institutions were obliged to create strategies that guarantee the continuity and quality in their teaching process, mainly by creating a learning paradigm based only on the virtual teaching and learning process via different technologies such as Zoom Cisco. However, as with any structure, the ICTs have security leaks that allow outsiders to enter the data, manipulate, or use it against the end-users. This situation happened with an initial version of the program Zoom, which resulted in selecting another tool, e.g., Cisco, for the teaching process. These modifications along the academic course and, of course, between countries or even regions can delimit the students' learning process. Therefore, this study's objective was to carry out a comparative study focusing on the inclusion and use of ICTs in Higher Education institutions in two different countries (Ecuador and Spain) to determine factors that could have caused changes in the educational paradigm. The study was carried out after the lockdown in Spain and Ecuador (September 2020), using descriptive observational research via a qualitative survey. The method used was a qualitative questionnaire via a Likert scale with a response range of (0 = disagree to 5 = strongly agree). The survey's spread was online, and email or instant messaging was sued to access the participants. The data was saved and later analyzed using the SPSS version 22, being the variables analyzed using frequencies, the mean, Mann-Whitney U, and Kruskal-Wallis. The survey was completed by 55 teachers (53.7% from Ecuador), who were between 30 and 40 years old and most familiar with less than ten years of experience or more than twenty. The statistical analysis showed that the use of ICTs in both countries was reinforced through the search of information(p<0.05), creation of teaching material(p<0.05), and use of virtual tools that promoted collaborative learning, being more significant via games or interactive environments (p<0.01). However, the lack of hardware assets and an optimal internet connection were limitations of using and integrating ICTs, mainly in Ecuador, and more common than expected in Spain (p<0.05).

Keywords:

ICTs, Covid-19, Higher education, comparative study.