Members of Senate and Council, Graduates, Ladies and Gentlemen.
What a pleasure it has been for the Chancellor and me to meet the new graduates this afternoon. We are greatly privileged that Betty Boothroyd is the titular head of the Open University - and the United Kingdom is extraordinarily fortunate that she is the Speaker of the House of Commons in this period of considerable constitutional change. May we express our appreciation to our Chancellor for the commitment and concern that she brings to both these important functions.
XXXXXXX
One of the Speaker’s roles is to protect the interests of the ordinary people from being overridden by the narrower interests of the powers that be. That is especially important at this present time of major constitutional change. The Open University is itself caught up in the current cycle of devolution of power. Scotland now has a Parliament that will have jurisdiction over education. In recognition of that democratic development the government has agreed to our request that support for OU students in Scotland will, henceforward, be the responsibility of the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council.
Here in England the final constitutional destination is less clear. However, a process of regionalisation is underway. In the government’s south-east region, that extends from here right up to the OU’s headquarters in Milton Keynes, the role of the South East England Development Agency will be increasingly important. We are working actively with that Agency and I am delighted to note that both its Deputy Chair, Mr Ken Bodfish, and its Head of Funding, Mr James Hedges, are here with us today.
A month ago the Open University reached its thirtieth birthday. The following week OU students celebrated that event in style by winning ‘University Challenge’. Let’s show our appreciation of their success.
Over thirty years the Open University has achieved success and impact in ways that its founders could scarcely have dreamed possible. Yet our development and expansion has always been faithful to our fundamental mission.
Our first Chancellor, Lord Crowther, articulated the values underlying that mission in a brilliant inaugural address. It was delivered 30 years ago but it could have been given yesterday. He began:
“This is the Open University.
“We are open, first, as to people.
“The first, and most urgent task before us is to cater for the many thousands of people, fully capable of a higher education, who, for one reason or another, do not get it, or do not get as much of it as they can turn to advantage.
“But this is not simply an educational rescue mission. We also aim wider and higher. Wherever there is an unprovided need for higher education, supplementing the existing provision, there is our constituency.
There are no limits on persons.”
The graduates know how the OU has been open to them. The comments you have made to the Chancellor this afternoon have been heart-warming. Openness to people remains the bedrock of our mission.
Lord Crowther continued:
“We are open as to places.
“our … local habitation in Milton Keynes is only where the tip of our toe touches ground; the rest of the University will be disembodied and airborne. From the start it will flow all over the United Kingdom.
“But it is already clear that the University will rapidly become one of the most potent and persuasive and profitable of our invisible exports. Wherever the English language is spoken or understood, and wherever there are men and women seeking to develop their individual potentialities beyond the limits of the local provision, there we can offer our help.
“There are no boundaries of space.”
How accurate and farsighted were those words. From Shetland in the North to the Channel Islands in the South, people have joined us in ever greater numbers.
The OU is now both British and international. 30,000 people are now taking Open University courses outside the UK and last year students wrote their exams in 111 countries.
You are members of an academic community that spans the world. Last year we created a sister institution, the United States Open University. By a nice coincidence USOU had its first formal event on the evening of our 30th birthday last month. A group of OU graduates met for dinner in California and I was able to present degrees to two American OU graduates, husband and wife, who had never yet managed to get to a degree ceremony.
Our first Chancellor continued:
“We are open as to methods.
“The original name was the University of the Air. I am glad that it was abandoned, for even the air would be too confining. The world is caught in a communications revolution, the effects of which will go beyond those of the industrial revolution of two centuries ago.
“Then the great advance was the invention of machines to multiply the potency of men's muscles. Now the great new advance is the invention of machines to multiply the potency of men's minds. As the steam engine was to the first revolution, so the computer is to the second.
Every new form of human communication will be examined to see how it can be used to raise and broaden the level of human understanding.
“There is no restriction on techniques.”
Today our openness to methods combines many technologies. We broadcast twenty hours a week on BBC2 and some OU programmes reach an audience of millions. Last year we sent out 1.1 million audiocassettes, 340,000 floppy disks and 130,000 CD-ROMs to students. This year 50,000 students are on line from home and each day they exchange 200,000 messages on 6,000 computer conferences.
Nevertheless, I suspect that today’s graduates found that the OU’s most important innovation involved people, not technology. I refer to the work of our very dedicated associate lecturers. They are sincerely committed to our mission, deeply involved in the deployment of new technologies, and crucial to the success of many of our students.
I know that the graduates feel indebted to all the OU people who have supported them, especially when they were discouraged. Let's show our appreciation for their work.
XXXXXX
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. All of you who have had OU students in your home or in your circle of friends are aware of the impact of OU study on family and social life. I expect you are now helping your graduate rediscover forgotten aspects of real life.
Help is now at hand for redecorating the house and cleaning the car! Extra family outings may now be possible. But before you dream about that I ask the graduates to show their appreciation to you.
XXXXXXXX
I return to Lord Crowther’s concluding remarks:
“We are open, finally, as to ideas.
“It has been said that there are two aspects of education, both necessary.
“One regards the individual human mind as a vessel, of varying capacity, into which is to be poured as much it will hold of the knowledge and experience by which human society lives and moves. This is the Martha of education - and we shall have plenty of these tasks to perform.
“But the Mary regards the human mind rather as a fire which has to be set alight and blown with the divine afflatus. This also we take as our ambition.”
Over thirty years the Open University has opened many minds. Sometimes those minds are set alight by the ideas, sometimes they just enjoy grappling with them. One graduate told me, with both satisfaction and exasperation, that after doing an OU degree he couldn’t see less than six sides to any question. I hope that OU study has given you all that attitude of systematic scepticism that inspires any academic community worth the name.
Please stay tuned to your academic community. You are automatically members of the Alumni Association and I encourage you to join the Association of Open University Graduates.
You can get OU news in Open Eye, that will now appear as a supplement to The Independent on the first Tuesday of every month. Each day a thousand graduates visit the alumni website which offers a range of services.
Think of yourselves as lifelong members of a unique academic community. It was founded with the inspiring ideals of being open as to people, open as to places, open as to methods and open as to ideas. You are evidence of the fulfilment of that ideal.
Last month I received a letter from Prime Minister Tony Blair. He wrote:
“The Open University has been one of this country’s success stories, both for technical innovation in education and in the way you have opened up opportunities for learning to large numbers of people who have been able to advance their careers and enrich their lives by studying with the Open University”
The Chancellor, the Prime Minister and I wish you all success as graduates and thank you for being part of the Open University.