Has anyone been really disappointed in an OU course they have studied?

Yes, I did the course on Inclusive Education. While it had a lot of good ideas, it had exceptionally high ideals as well. That's all well and good, but it was very biased and assumed from the start, that everyone accepts that real inclusive education (for every single child) is desirable. Having worked for 12 years in secondary education, and run a group for children with disabilities, some with severe learning difficulties,for almost as long, I know it never could work in this country. It didn't help that one of the course writers was my tutor.

I have to admit that my course materials are dated (referring to audio casette and video cassette for CD and DVD) but after the initial giggle this hasnt been a problem.

There are a few points in the course that I found to be quite biased or opinionated but not very often, overall I think it is well designed.

My problem is with one of my tutors - they dont teach, my TMA comments are entirely useless and in comparison with a fellow student not even consistent. When questioned I got a hugely hypocritical answer. I was penalised for answering the question and then told but in the exam I will have to answer exactly how I had. I had to subliminally know that this particular question needed an entirely different approach to what it asked.

So I am paying to not even be taught properly!

I remember my daughter having a tutor who was totally inconsistent with marking, and with comments. Her most recent tutor was greatly encouraging but when she had to call him with a query, he admitted that the course subject wasn't really his subject at all, and she should look in a library if she wanted to know more about the subject! I've been very fortunate with all but one of mine, but he was a nice enough guy, just very biased!

I would tend to agree with the fact, that the courses nearing their end can be quite dated. I studied the last presentation of one last year, and although the subject matter was really interesting, the out of date material was quite annoying.
Overall I have found the OU materials to be of high quality and the courses generally well worth the money spent on them. What I have found more disappointing, is the conduct of many of the tutors. It appears, that they regard the OU as somekind of charity for the educationally challenged, and only work there because it looks good on the CV.
I have only really had one tutor (on one of my current courses), who has managed to keep her personal prejudices under wraps and not come across as incredibly arrogant and patronising. I put it down to two factors, being female (I don't mean to be sexist, but most of the male tutors appear to have an ego big enough to fill the universe), and having been an OU student herself in the past.
It can be really off- putting when the feedback consists primarly of rude and sarcastic comments, and any queries are met by complete silence, or seen as somekind of personal challenge.

I had a problem last year with my tutor, I just felt like I wasnt "taught" maybe that was partly due to making the adjustment from college to self learning though. I felt that her comments were for the most part just not usefull and she spent a lot of the time telling me what I did wrong, I felt patronised to some extent.

However, my current tutor seems like a nice guy, I havent yet had to query him about anything yet though, but he did offer some helpful sources to help me improve my TMA writing style to push the grades up that bit more.

However, I would like to point out that this is not just an OU isolated problem, I know many Uni students who pay tutition fees and such, and have yet to recieve a lecture (opting-and being encouraged to simply download the notes)

Just achieved a degree with the O.U. so I'm a determined student [!] Some courses were great but I must say that not all courses I've studied have represented good practice.
My current course is poor: low morale and minimal effort from the course team, M364.

If you like animated staff and an up to date learning style, just don't bother with this...

good luck to all, ;)

I did not enjoy A200 , simply because it was too vast in its time scape and i found myself jumping around from medieval europe to colonial Africa, it was too vast a time period for me to stay interested. I passed by the way but did not enjoy the course. the materials were first class though as all the course material has been. But i prefer to narrow my learning and concentrate on specific areas and sorry OU this was just to much for me.

I am enjoying my current course though and will finish my degree next year I hope i am more determined to finish now than ever.

Regards Ray

Yes !!!
My last Course was SK120 Living with Diabetes.

I was absolutely appalled at the racist thread which ran through the Course.
I was convinced that I would not pass the final assignment if I did not show my absolute acceptance of multi-racism, multi-culturalism, and positive discrimination in favour of ethnic minorities in the U.K.

In tbe event, I did pass - not very well - but a basic pass. I had endeavoured to work around the racist aspect of the assignment. In my final Feedback I was 'knocked back' on Appropriate introduction and Appropriate conclusion presumably because I had made it quite clear, to my Tutor and in the Assignment, that I consider positive discrimination to be equally abhorent as the other kind.

I enjoyed other aspects of the Course and learned quite a lot from it. and was pleased to have passed. I just wonder why the Course Team found it necessary to introduce the racist aspect. Not to have done so would not have diminished the Course in any way - in my opinion.

""being female (I don't mean to be sexist, but most of the male tutors appear to have an ego big enough to fill the universe)""

Well that is incredibly sexist, it may be you don't like your work criticized by those men types!! lol

But seriously, I had one male tutor when I did A102 and he was very good.

Most have been good, male or female, must have been lucky.

I'm intending to do oceanography and a couple of more subjects in there final presentations. What's been said here is very interesting, yet worrying.

For Nimmy, ... there has never been any problem with having my work criticised by 'those male types'. When the criticism is clear and constructive, then there is not an issue, regardless of who it comes from. My intention was not to trash those 'male types' indiscriminately, (I like men, and am married to one!), merely to suggest, that when ever I have had a male tutor, there has been a problem if I have had to query anything. Either they have considered my query to be beneath themselves, or I have received condesending and hypocritical replies. The quality of teaching has been excellent overall. My main point was, that it seems, that male tutors (those I have had), dislike the occasional need to justify their feedback. Perhaps I've just been unlucky...

for Obese moggie - I think you miss the 'lol' and 'but seriously' bit. My comment were tongue in cheek and not intended to be taken seriously. I could see your comments where also not meant to be taken THAT seriously.

That said, you did make a comment that was sexist.

To say that most male tutors in the OU have this massive ego (thereby implying females don't), IS a generalisation, and therefore a bit sexist.

You should have said, 'most male tutors I'VE come into contact with'. This would be fine and a personal opinion based of your experiences. I imagine by far the majority of tutors you don't know, will be fine

If a male where to come on here and making a sweeping comment about female tutors, it would be knuckle wrapping time.

This is the reason I picked up on it. No antagonism meant, just an observation.

Nimmy, lol indeed. - Though I thought, that it would have been obvious, I was only referring to those tutors I have been in contact with. It would be impossible for me to have met them all...
I guess I was trying to(trying being the operative word here) highlight the difference in the respose I have received, when I have dared to ask for clarification in any matter.
In my extermly limited experience with the OU,(3 years,6 courses and 3 all gender ratio in tutors to date), it has been the male tutors who have indicated that their word is final and not to be questioned under any circumstances. And yes, I may have allowed this to get up my nose more than it should, but do think that negative and sarcastic comments don't enhance anyone's learning a great deal. (It may also be that I was having a particularly bad day, when I wrote the original post).

Overall I think the OU is great!

I have done 3 OU courses and have always been a little disappointed with the 'help' given by tutors. They seem to be unclear about what help they can and can't give.

The exception being my current tutor who I managed to get somehow by complaining about the previous one, 6 months into a 9 month course. I was thoroughly told off for complaining about the level of support I got, but the staff at the Nottingham Student Services were excellent, I have to say. I wish I had had my current tutor from the start, then I would not have got so discouraged as to seriously consider giving up my course, nor be aiming for a scrape-by kind of pass at the end.

I am currently studying biology and am a bit disappointed at the sheer volume of plain old regurgitation I am expected to do. I am too old for such things, memory not being what it was, but I'm quite good at thinking things through critically (slowly). No chance of any of that, it seems!

And I was also interested to hear about the sexism people felt creeps in at times. I have found this too, for example, a female who had a long and illustrious career in biology was merely mentioned in passing, whilst the male teams were presented in all their glory with details and photographs. Slight, but I noticed.

I've done seven courses and got my BA last year. I've never had a problem with any of the tutors. They've always answered (the few) questions I've asked of them. My only criticism would be of a computer course I did 10 years or so back that was in the first year of its presentation. The course materials were fine but the exam was all over the place, including questions that referred to knowledge of course examples rather than the principles it was trying to teach.

Other than that, I can't fault the OU. As long as I have the cash, I'll keep taking courses. I would happily become an OU Evangelist if such a role existed.

I recently studied a course on Childhood and Youth and the latest information went back to 2002. I don't Know if this is considered acceptable for courses, but lots of info. was way out of date -especially those around technology. It was a little wierd doing some of the TMA's because I found arguing certain points were no longer or less relevant than they are today. The very approachable and supportive tutor made up for it though.

this is just my second course, but I feel that the level of support offered by the tutors can be variable...on my previous ocurse, I and a colleague (doing the same course but with different tutors) had a completely different experience. Her tutor was engaged with the students and because of the encouraging approach, she really enjoyed her course. My tutor was totally disengaged and answered no questions. We were always just referred to course materials...

I have given up on two courses over the years. Not so much due to the quality of the courses as that they didn't turn out to be as I expected. In both cases I was not enjoying the course and therefore felt I was doing myself no favours in putting myself through the stress of continuing (and make no mistake meeting deadlines for TMA's amd exams do impose some stress). Another course which I struggled with for similar reasons I did manage to complete and gain a grade 3 pass, goodness knows how.

As far as the quality of tutoring is concerned I have had no problems. Mind you, I did have the same excellent tutor for 3 courses!

I'm massively disappointed in the OU's modern languages courses.

I started the OU aiming for a Modern Language Studies degree, and to that end I started on the English Language strand at level 2.

It was fantastic, teaching a broad a deep swathe of general linguistics and deep grammatical concepts.  The course materials were books that I could just read and read and read, as they explained everything to me.

Then I started on the languages themselves.

Really lowest-common-denominator stuff.  It assumed no knowledge of grammatical concepts, and more importantly made no attempt to teach them.  All the subtleties presented in the English grammar were gone and words were either good, bad or neutral; formal, informal or neutral.  I got to the end of the Spanish and there was nothing there you couldn't get cheaper from a bookshelf course and a private tutor for half the price.

In fact, there was nothing in the degree that I would describe as academic.

But I want this degree -- I need this degree -- so I'm pushing on with the French. Two years left and then I can wash my hands of the OU.  I won't be back.

I've a BSc from UMIST, an MSc from the OU and I'm starting a BA with the OU now.

I have found the teaching, the materials and the support from the OU far superior to my 'bricks 'n' mortar' institution. It is also more consistent. Sure, there is the occasional first run of a course which is not as well organised as the rest and some where the material needs a refresh.

All University learning is self-directed. Sink or swim, tutors won't help that much.

I've only had one tutor who I didn't get on with, the others have all been fantastic. I've found them to be realistic about what I can achieve in the time I've got, encouraging, approachable and helpful. I can't speak highly enough of all but one tutor I've had.

As for courses, I have felt a bit short changed by short courses, as they seem to be an awful lot of work for not many points (or do I just always pick particularly hard ones?!) but have still not really been disappointed.

A friend of mine (now in her seventies) was one of the first OU students, and she still speaks very highly of her experience, and is chuffed to bits that I (in my thirties) am doing it.

I would avoid D270 Family Meanings like the plague - awful content...and sooooo tedious. How much do you really need to know about the meaning of family - other than it is unique from person to person, and in terms of personal perception?!...Horrible! I have enjoyed D271, DSE232, AD252, and U216 immensely (although U216 has been particularly challenging).

 At the risk of stating the obvious....it's horses for courses. Two of my favourite courses so far have been other people's least favourite, and vice versa.  I've been on courses with people who've had unrealistic expectations - they could have found out the truth by looking at course materials at their regional centre, and saved themselves some money and time!

I don't think it's sensible to discuss dated materials and lacklustre tutorial support together - it's surely inevitable that if a course is near the end of its life, material is comparatively dated (though not necessarily any the worse for that, in my experience). However, the tutorial support really depends on the tutor - I can't imagine a good tutor decides to become rubbish just because the course is near the end of its life.

Personally I've been fortunate - never had a bad tutor yet, although obviously you click with some rather more than others.