Online education is changing the way we learn. Innovative institutions, professors, and amateur educators have demonstrated their capacity to broadcast education online. Boasting 130+ million views, a new partnership in art history, and plans for a physical school, Khan Academy is an excellent example of how the internet can be harnessed to provide decent education for all.
But Khan Academy has a major flaw—one that keeps it from achieving the educational reach of real universities. Until very recently, Salman Khan was the only instructor represented on the site. While an excellent amateur educator with verve and panache, Sal Khan is no expert, which is increasingly evident as he deviates from math and science toward the humanities.
What we really need is a website with the clarity and effectiveness of Khan Academy along with the diversity and variety afforded by multiple instructors. Rather than a school of Khan, we need a school for the entire world to share its variety of expertise and knowledge in pithy, high-quality videos. Youtube does a decent job hosting other online educators, but a separate site, such as WorldWideAcademy.org, could be a whole lot more.
Some sites are attempting to be a space for online learning, but none yet achieves the perfect balance. Sparknotes provides video lessons for their users but the lessons are great quality. SkillShare promises users they can “learn anything from anyone,” but they do this by arranging in-person meetings, not video broadcast, limiting their reach. EduTube provides educational videos, but the site is difficult to navigate and the videos themselves often aren’t very instructional. EduFire offers online lessons but charges money to viewers, while Grockit does the same for test prep.
Each of these websites embraces a part of what WorldWideAcademy could be, but none of them seems to achieve the depth or scope necessary to teach the world. In an ideal execution, WorldWideAcademy would provide free, convenient video lessons (ideally created with the great and easy-to-use technology from Livescribe) delivered by the best professional teachers in their areas of expertise. Contributing instructors could also “peer review” each other’s work to promote the highest quality for curious students.
Overall, this isn’t an idea rooted in technology—there’s no complex digital website to build. Instead, the point of WorldWideAcademy would be to facilitate the creation, curation, and sharing of great lessons from the world’s best teachers.