More and more professors are choosing to share their class presentations online with anyone who wishes to see and hear them. From an instructional perspective, there are the obvious pedagogical issues: Why should students bother to come to class if they can view it in their pajamas at home? Is the online experience the same as in-person participation?
Technology now allows students to ask questions and participate live—or at least subsequently in online chat rooms—and many teachers say such experiences are superior to taking notes in a mass lecture.
There are also copyright issues. Who owns the content? Under what circumstances should colleges award credit or charge a fee?
More than once professors have discovered that they have been recorded surreptitiously by students in class, utilizing the video function of their cell phones. Of course these clips have appeared on YouTube, often displayed out of context to showcase any embarrassing or comical aspects of a presentation. As you might expect, some professors are camera shy.
The latest Campus Computing Survey, which gathers data on classroom technology nationwide, found that 28 percent of colleges have a strategic plan to provide coursecasting equipment, and 35 percent more are working on a plan now, according to a recent article by Jeffrey Young in the Chronicle of Higher Education (subscription). The piece summarizes the various issues associated with online lectures. The discussion gets complicated very quickly.
Here's an interesting passage from the article:
And though hundreds of colleges have set up channels on YouTube or reserved sections of Apple's iTunes Store devoted to material from colleges, the majority of the public content on those sites consists of marketing material or sports highlights rather than course lectures.
It's worth noting that the famous aphorism "Information wants to be free" is part of a longer quote from Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Catalog editor who is also a computer pioneer. The other part of what he said, at a conference in 1984, was "Information wants to be expensive because it's so valuable. The right information in the right place just changes your life."
The next few years could be crucial for determining how this balance tips for lecture videos, which can be produced for next to nothing but remain highly valuable in the eyes of professors and administrators.
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