EDINBURGH DEGREE CEREMONY (3)
6 May 2000, Afternoon
Vice-Chancellor's Address to the Graduates
Graduates, Guests and Colleagues:
It has been inspiring to talk to the graduates individually. Many of you said that an OU degree is hard work but most of you seem to have enjoyed it. That encourages me to give you a final test today. It's like a CMA - that's a Computer Marked Assignment – but I will provide the answers even faster than the computer.
Each question is a short quotation. You have to identify the source.
If you are ready for number 1 the quotation is:
“The Open University has been marvellously successful in showing how open access can be squared with top-class achievement”
That quote comes from a university researcher. At which university?
1. The OU
2. Edinburgh
3. Glasgow Caledonian
4. Liverpool
It’s the Liverpool University Centre for Education and Employment Research. OU degrees are highly esteemed – which is why 41,000 employers sponsor their staff to study with the OU.
Let me move on to my next quote:
“Today, we’re pushing out the boundaries of technology as the OU, excellent institution that it is, has been doing all along”
Who might have said that?
1. Bill Gates
2. Richard Branson
3. Tim Berners-Lee
4. Henry McLeish
This was Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, speaking a few weeks ago. The event was the OU’s first degree ceremony of the new millennium at which he became an honorary doctor of the OU. That ceremony was also the world’s first virtual degree ceremony. Graduates, honorary graduate, guests and OU staff were all linked together on the Web. It was the inaugural e-ceremony of the leading e-university.
Let’s move to quote number 3:
“I yield to no one in my admiration for Open University students. It seems a great deal more difficult to do an OU degree than to be feather bedded through university like most students are.”
Who do you think said that?
1. Jeremy Paxman
2. Margaret Thatcher
3. Cherie Booth
4. Donald Dewar
In fact it was Jeremy Paxman. Last year, when the OU won his TV quiz game, University Challenge, he complained that OU students were really too good to compete against students from ordinary universities like Oxford and Birmingham. Take that as a compliment.
Let’s move to my final quote:
“The extraordinary role of the Open University degrees in furthering the peace process in Northern Ireland is acknowledged throughout the Republican sector as well as by the smaller Loyalist political parties whose support for the Good Friday agreement of 1998 and for the 1999 Northern Ireland Executive is vital”
Where did that quote come from?
1. The Irish Times
2. The Times Higher Educational Supplement
3. The Scotsman
4. Mo Mowlem
It’s from an article by Anne MacHardy in the Times Higher Educational Supplement earlier this year. Over the period of the Troubles hundreds of Republican and Loyalist prisoners have studied with the OU in the Maze and other prisons. You should be proud of the way that your university has broadened their horizons and led them to seek peaceful routes towards a settlement.
This year there are over 7,000 OU students in the island of Ireland, slightly more than half of them in the Republic. The OU in Ireland operates in an integrated way in North and South and that too is a contribution to understanding and peace.
That’s the end of my little quiz. Do not worry if you didn’t score very well. Praise for the OU and its students comes from many sources, including some that you wouldn’t expect.
But I do congratulate you all on your success in the much stiffer test of completing an OU degree. It is good to celebrate that success this afternoon in the presence of many of the OU’s Scottish staff who have helped you.
This has been a very important year for the OU in Scotland because at the beginning of last month the responsibility for the public funding of OU teaching in Scotland moved formally from the Higher Education Funding Council for England, which had previously funded the OU throughout the United Kingdom, to the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council.
This transfer of funding responsibility is the result of a request made by the OU itself in 1998 when the process of setting up the Scottish Parliament began. We are delighted that our request has been granted and that the funding responsibility for the OU’s teaching here has moved from south to north of the border: from Westminster to the Scottish Parliament, and from the Department for Education and Employment to the Scottish Executive. This represents the full integration of the Open University into the Scottish higher education system.
The OU has deep roots in Scotland. Jennie Lee was one of its progenitors. Walter Perry left the post of Vice-Principal of this University of Edinburgh to be the OU’s first Vice-Chancellor. From the beginning Scots have been enthusiastic participants in Open University study and this year the number of OU students in Scotland has set a new record. There is scarcely a postcode in Scotland that does not have OU students among its residents.
The core function of our OU team in the Scotland, under the experienced and wise leadership of Mr Peter Syme, is to help students and support our associate lecturers. The graduates know that our tutors are deeply committed to their OU students. At the event we held last week to mark the transfer of funding Dr Elaine Murray, an OU tutor who is now a member of the Scottish Parliament, talked in a touching and inspiring way about what teaching OU students had meant to her. I expect there were moments for each of today’s graduates when their tutor’s encouragement was crucial.
Let's show our appreciation for Peter Syme and all the OU staff who have helped and inspired you during your studies.
I expect there are other people to whom you also feel grateful. It is wonderful that so many of your family members, relatives and friends are here today.
Success in the Open University depends on the tolerance and support of others. Everyone here is aware of the impact of OU study on family and social life. No doubt you are now helping your graduate rediscover forgotten aspects of real life.
Help is now at hand for redecorating the house and landscaping the garden! Extra family outings may now be possible. But before you dream about that I ask the graduates to show their appreciation to you.
If you have enjoyed your OU studies I urge you to keep in touch with your University. I encourage you to join the Association of Open University Graduates and I remind you that you are automatically members of the Alumni Association - The OU LINK.
You can find out more through Open Eye - the alumni magazine - the monthly version appears in The Independent newspaper on the First Tuesday of every month. The second annual edition will be posted to everyone in May this year. With a circulation of 350,000, it must be the most widely read alumni magazine in the world!
The Alumni website is well worth visiting. You can register your interest and receive personal monthly updates by email of all new services and current events.
The major alumni event for this year is the Alumni weekend around Open Day 2000 on June 24th. Do come along to Walton Hall with your families. Alternatively you can, for the first time, visit the Virtual Open Day on the OU Website.
We encourage you to think of yourselves as lifelong members of a unique academic community to follow its future development closely. Let me end by mentioning four growth areas in this very exciting period of development..
First, the OU curriculum continues to develop briskly. This month we launch Openings, a new series of access courses. Then in November we begin undergraduate Business Studies. Meanwhile many areas of the University are producing short courses for professional development that may be of interest to you as graduates.
Second, the OU continues to expand its international reach. This year sees the launch of the first courses by our sister institution, the United States Open University - a new university for a new millennium. Very soon I hope that the OU and the USOU will be able to trade courses back and forth across the Atlantic.
Third, the OU continues to develop as a validating and accrediting university. In this context we are proud of our relationship with the University of the Highlands and Islands Project and it is a pleasure to thank mr Gavin Ross, the Chair of the OU’s Validating Committee, for his leadership in this growing area of our academic activity.
Finally, the OU is the leading e-university. More than 80,000 OU students are now online from home and they generate a huge communication traffic. I particularly appreciate the work of the Student Association, OUSA, which does an excellent job moderating hundreds of computer conferences.
Thanks to these and other developments your University will continue to thrive. Professor Cochrane, all my OU colleagues and I wish you every success as graduates and thank you for being part of the Open University.