Open University
Saturday, 22, Nov 2008 03:38
What is the Open University?
The Open University is the UK's largest university, and it differs from other higher education institutions in that its courses are designed to be studied primarily by distance learning - that is, by people studying from their homes or workplaces, in their own time.
OU courses are open to anyone, regardless of educational qualifications, and since it opened in 1971, it has educated over two million students.
Courses use a range of teaching media - specially-produced textbooks, TV and radio programmes, audio and video tapes, computer software and home experiment kits. Personal contact and support comes through locally-based tutors, a network of 330 regional study centres in the UK and overseas and annual residential schools.
The OU offers more than 600 undergraduate and postgraduate courses in arts, modern languages, social sciences, health and social welfare, science, mathematics and computing, technology, business and management, education and law.
Like most conventional degrees, OU undergraduate courses take three years of full-time study. However, most students study at half the full-time rate, combining their studies with work or family or other commitments. The average time taken for students to complete OU undergraduate courses is six years.
Background
Ideas about the potential of using broadcast media for educational purposes had been in circulation as early as 1926, when the historian JC Stobart proposed a "wireless university" to the BBC.
By the early 1960s, the idea was extremely popular in left political circles, although the conservative academic world was highly sceptical. In March 1963, a Labour party study group, chaired by Lord Taylor, produced a report warning of the exclusion of large parts of the population from higher education and proposing an experimental "University of the Air" employing television and radio.
Although the idea did not feature in Labour's 1964 election manifesto, the prime minister, Harold Wilson, regarded it as a personal project. He appointed Jennie Lee, the minister for the arts, responsible for the plan after the election. She rejected plans developed under the previous Conservative government for a "college of the air", insisting that it must be a university. Her work led to the February 1966 white paper, "university of the air", and plans for the new institution were included in Labour's 1966 manifesto. Although Harold Wilson's support was critical, it is widely agreed that Baroness Lee's work shaped the new institution as it came into being.
Following Labour's election victory, in September 1967, a cabinet planning committee was set up "to work out a comprehensive plan for an open university". The name "university of the air" had been dropped, due to media ridicule of the idea of people obtaining degrees by watching TV and Baroness Lee's personal hostility to it. Many continued to oppose the idea, with Iain Macleod MP famously describing the plans as "blithering nonsense".
Prospectuses were published in 1969 (before the courses were prepared), and by mid-1970 it was clear that there was enough interest for the OU to succeed. An annual intake of 25,000 students had been intended by Wilson, but the election of Edward Heath's Conservative government that year led to this being cut. The first OU students began to study in 1971.
By the end of the 1970s, the OU was firmly established as a respected educational institution, with 70,000 students and 6,000 graduating each year. Since then, the OU has been at the forefront of the educational application of new technology, from video, through the advent of personal computers, to the internet. Today the OU supports the largest online academic community in the world where some 400,000 users and students are engaged in more than 96,000 electronic conferences.
In August 2008 the Open University launched a YouTube (tm) Channel with over 300 videos covering subjects from arts and history to science and nature. The OU plans to launch a YouTube Research Channel in 2009.
The Beagle 2 Mars lander - built by an Open University research team - was launched into space in June 2003 and the OU is playing a leading part in a UK scientific effort to put key technology aboard the European Space Agency's ExoMars mission launching in 2011 as part of ESA's Aurora Programme of Planetary Exploration.
Controversies
The Open University is widely regarded as a success, insofar as it has achieved its objective of widening access to higher education to all, regardless of background or previous educational qualifications.
Some regretted the use of "university" in the title at its founding, on account of the middle class values it represented. Initially, the OU and Baroness Lee were widely resented by the adult education system, the Workers' Educational Association and local education authorities, which Harold Wilson's original vision had put at the heart his idea. However, the expansion of higher education in the 1980s and 1990s largely undermined that position.
Statistics
The Open University has approximately 150,000 undergraduate and more than 30,000 postgraduate students. 10,000 students have disabilities.
Around 70 per cent of undergraduate students are in full-time employment. Over 50,000 students are sponsored by their employers for their studies.
11,000 people are currently studying for OU Higher Degrees.
More than 25,000 OU students live outside the UK.
Source: The Open University – August 2008
Quotes
“I am a great admirer of the OU. It is one of the finest creations of previous governments and I firmly believe that it opens doors and unlocks potential.
“There is a social and economic imperative to see as many people as possible going into Higher Education. Other countries are ahead of us in terms of the number of students undertaking HE – fifty per cent of UK jobs in the future will require HE experience."
Higher Education Minister Bill Rammell - March 2008
"The Open University is open to people, places, methods and ideas. It promotes educational opportunity and social justice by providing high-quality university education to all who wish to realise their ambitions and fulfil their potential."
OU Mission Statement