The Digital Inclusion to the Vulnerable Groups in Education

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue investigates the inclusive potential of educational media technology, based upon a review of recent approaches in informal, formal and continuous education. The aim is to present approaches at the intersection of technology-enhanced learning and teaching, the ongoing development of computer sciences and respective information technological approaches, as well as societal developments regarding community development. The scholarly dimension will incorporate perspectives from humanities, social sciences, computing and technological fields. Papers should reflect special needs of citizens (i.e., not only learners) in any sector toward education, from informal to formal learning and including situated education in the context of the home or workplace.

Most recently, the coronavirus pandemic led to a strong need for the inclusion of even the average population without any special needs into formal education. Reflecting this development, the focus of this Special Issue in Societies will be on both special needs and special conditions addressing requirements of TEL/TET. Accordingly, particular attention will be given to international and even global comparative studies of how educational media technology is applied in an inclusive way, covering both individual psycho-physiological as well as socio-cultural dimensions. Subsequently, authors should be able to identify diverse perspectives of inclusiveness when it comes to the adoption of educational media technology.

Particular attention will be given to the need for the integration of vulnerable target groups, e.g., migrant persons, persons with low qualifications, persons with handicaps, or persons who are directly affected by the digital divide, etc. Their participation in society and education is an important and increasingly relevant task for inclusive practices worldwide. Connecting inclusion and the use of digitalization in the qualification process will be of decisive importance. This Special Issue highlights the need to introduce lower/differently qualified people with a migrant background. To date, this group has—with a few exceptions such as research into smartphone use—not been considered a topic of interest in digitalization, due to both a manageable level of interest and, in part, an understanding of roles shaped by their countries of origin. Today, adult education is inconceivable without the use of digital teaching and learning tools. However, in terms of the qualification of vulnerable target groups with little previous knowledge, concepts, practicable teaching and learning materials geared to the respective learning objectives are not available or are only available in rudimentary forms. This means that trainers and teaching staff cannot qualify individuals in these groups in accordance with the current limitations (e.g., COVID-19 or the recent large migration waves) and expected requirements arising from the digital transformation. Thus, chances of inclusion into society rely on corresponding qualifications which also rely on suitable offers of educational and migration institutions. The aims of this Special Issue are to:

1. Gain insights into the status and need for action in the implementation of competence frameworks among vulnerable target groups;
2. Develop criteria and guidelines for digital learning in an application-oriented manner connected to develop digital learning arrangements;
3. Develop curricula for trainers and teaching staff for the use of digital learning arrangements and to implement them in capacity building;
4. Reflect the role of peer groups in digital inclusion and effective practices, e.g., for promoting digital skills among older adults;
5. Identify innovative support systems as well as the role of learning support measures for those with special physical/perceptive needs;
6. Develop an integrative consideration of the needs of the target groups, their opportunities and also necessity of digital learning together with action-oriented learning concepts as theoretical bases;
7. Develop innovative arrangements for anchoring digital learning in an inclusive qualification practice.

In this Special Issue, contributions must be papers, articles, conceptual papers or reviews and address the topic of the Special Issue.

Prof. Dr. Thomas Koehler
Prof. Dr. Danijela Birt Katić
Prof. Dr. Alex Kendall
Prof. Dr. Ulrike Lucke
Dr. Christa Markom
Prof. Dr. Jelena Tošić
Prof. Dr. Kristina Barczik
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as conceptual papers are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Societies is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• action-oriented learning
• anthropology of education/educational anthropology
• capacity building and training program effectiveness
• curriculum development
• digital competence frameworks
• digital inclusion
• digital learning
• education
• educational media technology
• gender and migration
• inclusion/exclusion
• inequality
• informal, formal and continuous education
• intersectionality
• minoritization/majoritization
• pandemic/crisis
• teacher training
• tel/tet
• transnational comparative research
• vulnerability
• acceptance and behavior for digital technologies among vulnerable groups