Educational Chatbots As Pedagogical Mediators in Higher Education: Implementation in Virtual and Face-to-Face Engineering Programmes

The recent development of generative artificial intelligence has driven new forms of interaction between students, teachers, and technological systems within higher education. Among these tools, educational chatbots are positioned as conversational assistants capable of providing personalised support, facilitating access to academic information, and mediating learning processes in different educational environments. This paper analyses two experiences of implementation of educational chatbots at the National Technological University (UTN): TutorVirtualUTN, integrated in the virtual campus of the La Plata Regional Faculty (FRLP) using the ChatBotPress platform with GPT-3.5 Turbo, supporting 127 first-year engineering students in Algebra and Mathematical Analysis; and ProfeVirtual, deployed via the POE platform (Claude Instant model) as a digital twin of the teacher in Probability and Statistics, implemented across two cohorts (50 and 45 students) at the Avellaneda Regional Faculty (FRA). The study adopted a quantitative descriptive approach based on surveys applied during the 2024 and 2025 academic years. Results show comprehension rates improving from 56