Abstract:

The lockdown of the COVID19 pandemic has shaped many sectors but especially higher education which must be an essential element of education according to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. In this context, Sustainable Development Goal 4, “Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”, is an essential goal to underline the important role and comparative advantage of an adequately resourced.

Increasing support for the implementation of an e-learning platform creation in times of pandemic and specifically in developing countries to support students' learning in states of emergency has become a necessity.

Accordingly, this study highlights the economic, demographics, and sustainable factors that influence the permanence and continuity of the teaching-learning system in a state of emergency. The empirical analysis is performed on a sample of 11528 high school students from the National Survey of Multipurpose Household 2019 of the National Institute of Statistics and Census (INEC) of Ecuador. The distance synthetic indicator “DP2”, defined by Pena Trapero, and different multivariate techniques focused on Partial Least Squared (PLS) were applied.

Results show that the impact on e-learning was strongly affected by variables such as possession of digital devices for learning, access to the internet, geographic area, and practice of sport. The findings provide suggestions and recommendations for practitioners and future research.

Keywords:

Digital Divide, economic factor, e-learning, Ecuador, geographic area, Partial least square (PLS), Sustainability.