Education Students' Challenges in Using Digital Technologies for Online Learning: Basis for Institutionalization Plan

The study aimed to reveal the challenges experienced by the education students in using digital technologies with the end phase of developing an institutionalization plan. The utilization and integration of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the field is already critical to prepare the learners to be competent and skilled individuals for the 21st century's opportunities and challenges. However, various challenges and gaps arise because of the differences between and among the various stakeholders' preferences, capabilities, privileges, and affordances to digital technologies. It was even more intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic, where tertiary education institutes shifted to an online learning delivery modality. From the literature review, the researcher summarized the five factors that influenced the challenges of using digital technologies in education. Those are the availability and physical access to up-to-date devices and infrastructures; geographical location and community type; income, poverty, and socio-economic status; level of education and digital literacy skills of teachers; and motivation, engagement, and interest. These five (5) main factors have been the basis for crafting the interview questions administered to 20 second-year education students. Interview data were analyzed, and four themes emerged to generalize the challenges experienced by the students: (1) unavailability and physical inaccessibility to digital technologies; (2) poor internet connection relative to residence; (3) low socioeconomic status and inaccessibility to digital technologies; and (4) disengagement in using digital technologies. The four themes became the basis used in crafting the institutionalization plan.