Publication record
- Original publication period
- January–June 2020
- Digitized / uploaded online
- August 10, 2026
The digitization/upload date records when this file was added to the website; it is not the article's original publication date.
Abstract
This scoping review examines why device ownership and internet availability are inadequate proxies for students’ ability to participate in remote education. Drawing on Philippine and international evidence available through 2021, it reconstructs access as a journey: obtaining a usable device, reaching a stable connection, affording repeated use, finding time and space to study, completing platform-specific tasks, and recovering when a link fails. Rurality shapes each step through distance, market coverage, electricity, transport, and household livelihood patterns, but rural communities are not homogeneous. The synthesis introduces the concept of an access threshold: participation occurs only when all minimum conditions for a specific learning task are met at the same time. It recommends task-level access audits, offline-first design, and monitoring of failed attempts rather than enrollment alone. No local survey data are claimed.