Challenges to Promote Inclusion in Distance Education: Insights from an Analysis of the Digital Skills of Visually Impaired Students in Mexican Higher Education
Abstract: Distance education can provide learners with disabilities with valuable opportunities to learn at their own pace and within their own capabilities. In order to identify the technological challenges that low-vision and non-sighted Mexican undergraduate students may face during online education due to lack of digital literacy, this study examined their current use of ICTs for educational networking and collaboration, for information searching and processing, and for academic communication. Results from a 27-item multidimensional questionnaire indicate that learners limit their use of ICT to leisure purposes and lack knowledge and skills with regard to the use of different ICTs for educational purposes. Building upon these results, we call for diagnoses of the digital skills of learners with disabilities interested in distance education and the implementation of educational strategies to help learners develop and extrapolate their current ICT competencies to effective learning practices.