Abstract

This study aimed to determine how digital educational platforms transform the social and cultural practices of young people and influence the formation of new mechanisms of social mobility. The research encompassed three countries with distinct educational and cultural traditions: South Korea, the United States, and the United Kingdom. The methodology was grounded in a stepwise analysis of official documents and statistical data, corporate reports, and academic studies, as well as a comparative assessment of the key parameters of digital platforms, including value orientations, mobility mechanisms, and cultural educational practices. The analysis demonstrated that the national Korean platform of massive open online courses operated as an institutionalised channel for converting young people’s academic achievements into symbolic and educational capital, while simultaneously supporting collective forms of online learning and group identity. In the United States, an examination of the Coursera platform and the educational segment of YouTube indicated the predominance of personalised learning trajectories, a focus among young people on career mobility, and the entrepreneurial use of knowledge, particularly through certification programmes and practices of creating and monetising educational content. The analysis of these cases made it possible to delineate specific models of media education that developed around each platform and shaped the modes through which young people accumulated cultural capital. At the same time, YouTube emerged as an environment that fosters an attention economy, where educational channels with audiences in the millions became a source of both knowledge and income for content creators. In the United Kingdom, the principal focus was placed on the BBC Bitesize platform, which during the pandemic reached at least six million users per week and became an important instrument for equalising opportunities in examination preparation for pupils from low-income families. The practical significance of the study lies in its potential application to the development of educational strategies that take cultural specificities into account and enhance social mobility and equality of access to knowledge in the digital age

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