CLVIII. LA EDUCACIÓN VIRTUAL EN TIEMPOS DE CORONAVIRUS: ENTRE LA APOLOGÍA BUROCRÁTICA Y EL DENUNCISMO APOCALÍPTICO

Abstract

This paper aims to address the relevance of e-learning in higher education today specifically,
in the context of new challenges derived by Covid-19 and the conditions of social distancing
that it entail. From this perspective, the objective is to analyze the strengths that virtual
education can provide qualifying higher education processes, that in terms of presential
methodologies were in crisis. This objective is approached under a qualitative methodology
that integrates the research technique of documentary analysis. According to what is
presented, the ways in which face-to-face and virtuality can be articulated and complemented
are highlighted, considering the reconceptualization of the quality of education, which should
be understood around the acquisition of skills and useful knowledge and applied, where
Information and Communication Technologies play the role of complementary methodology
and facilitating tool for students and university teaching staff. Finally, it is concluded that the
virtual methodology was not born with the pandemic and it will not end with it, it is a
transformation process that started many years ago, which should not be idealized or
stigmatized, but must be assumed promptly and systematically, to integrate definitively and
efficiently to the challenges of education in the third decade of the 21st century.