Is it really possible to earn a distance degree through this well-known Internet site? Would some professors actually consider offering an online college degree program through this site? Will it one day be possible to get a distance Associate Degree through www.YouTube.com (YouTube)?

Currently, a number of limitations make it unlikely that a distance learning degree program will be offered through this website any time in the near future. Recently, however, a California professor from Pitzer College decided to teach a media course related to YouTube. Professor Alex Juhasz offered her students this distant learning opportunity during the winter quarter of the 2007-2008 school year. Her experiment led to some interesting findings.

First, students found that education learning online required privacy, discipline, and control of the educational environment. These concepts were profoundly lacking in YouTube, where the videotaped classroom sessions, as well as the students’ papers, were available for anyone to view. Students found that the best online degree classrooms required a significant degree of privacy, confidentiality, and trust between students and the professor.

Furthermore, distance learning online requires a means of adequate expression of facts and ideas. The limited context offered by YouTube (students were able to use no more than 500 characters to submit a paper or develop and produce a video presentation) made accomplishing this goal difficult. Additionally, the students faced the challenge of making the presentations lively and expressive enough to evoke interest and discussion from fellow students. This proved to be quite difficult.

Juhasz also posed the argument that students who wish to earn a degree online also require the structure and uniformity that characterizes traditional classroom settings. This degree of structure is typically not present in most distance learning education online programs, however. In contrast to her opinion, most online degree school students claim to prefer the freedom and flexibility offered by distance learning university degree programs.

Juhasz concluded that, while Internet sites such as YouTube may contribute valuable experience to some college degree programs, it was not ready to take the place of the virtual – or the actual – classroom. This site may offer valuable experience to students taking information systems degree courses, or those working toward a distance degree in journalism or media. The technology, however, is not yet capable of supporting higher education courses at a college degree level.

True, YouTube is probably not yet ready to offer a distance degree forum for distance education programs. Despite this, however, Judas has opened exciting new possibilities for the future of distance learning. The problems encountered by the students attempting an online degree course, however, is reminiscent of the early days of online degree university programs only decades ago. Who knows – one day, perhaps YouTube will be as popular a forum for distance degree students as course chatboards are today!

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