History of the OU

The history of The Open University project is attempting to assess the impact of the OU on wider society, but the ripple effect of its education via its graduates would be difficult to quantify.

A perusal of mentions of the Open University in news articles just today gives a flavour of the diversity of people who have studied with the OU and how it might have effected their professional lives. The Scottish Business Insider reports that Nosheena Mobarik, co-founder of M Computer Technologies, has been appointed Chairperson of the CBI in Scotland. She studied with The Open University when her children were young. Anne Fielding Smith’s appointment as the new principal of Strode’s College is reported in the Midweek Observer. Anne has studied part time with The Open University for three years. The East Fife Mail reports that local artist Teresa Doughty is opening the Merchant’s Room in the Scottish Fisheries museum. Teresa has a degree in psychology from The Open University.

Finally, there is an interview with Shamrock Rovers manager Michael O’Neil in the Daily Mail. O’Neil, who was a childhood football prodigy playing in the Newcastle youth team with Gazza and is now making Irish football history as he takes the Shamrock Rovers into the group stage of a European competition for the first time ever, talks about the Open University degree in maths and statistics he achieved while he was at Dundee United.

In mid-August The Open University was again ranked among the top three UK universities for student satisfaction in the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) National Student Survey of 265, 000 final-year students studying at 154 universities and 99 further education colleges. The response rate of 65% – the highest rate in the seven years that the NSS has been running. A third of students (32%) were unhappy with the level of assessment and feedback they received, while a quarter (25%) criticised the organisation and management of their course and 10% of UK students were disatisfied with the quality of their qualifications. (more…)

One of the ways in which the OU has had an impact is in helping learners transfer their skills and apply their formally assessed learning within the informal sector. It has enabled the production of knowledge outside the academy through a commitment to communities of ex-students. Students, many of whom had never met one another, have been encouraged to go on to form informal, voluntary, convivial, educational communities of practice based on those studies. These have enabled them to achieve together that which they could not separately. There are many OU examples of partnerships and traffic across what has been characterised as a ‘moving frontier’ between the state and civil society.

Between 1976 and 1985 a second level module, Art and environment, did not offer practical skills in painting or sculpture nor did it offer art criticism or cognitive skills. Rather it dealt with ‘the processes and attitudes of art’ and sought to develop ‘strategies for creative work’. Members of the society created by former students of the module, ‘share skills, experiences, ideas and knowledge of creativity and personal growth’.

Created, in 1998, by students and staff from an interdisciplinary third level module, The Family & Community Historical Research Society has conducted a range of connected local historical projects, encourages links between institutionally based and independent researchers and offers its own Continued Learning courses. This society is formally registered as a charity.

A first level digital photography module which was first presented in 2007 encourages students to upload photographs and discuss them online. Former students have established their own online groups in order to continue to collaborate.

In September 2010 the work of 36 OU students was collated into a book by fellow student Esther Clark At home with words includes 72 short stories and poems, many written for A215 Creative Writing but others written especially for the book. All profits from the book will go to Cancer Research UK which was also sponoired by a specialist letting company, Leaders.

If you know of a course which inspired people to go on learning together, please contact us.

In the May 1985 DES Green Paper The Development of Higher Education into the 1990s (HMSO, London, Cmd 9524) the OU was the only named institution which received any favourable comments, being seen as the major provider of part-time degrees. There are now far more part-time students, four in ten undergraduates, but they still tend to be marginalised. The OU remains a significant provider and in order for concerns about the needs of those who work and study to reach the appropriate Parliamentary ears it fell to Vice-Chancellor Martin Bean to present the case for part-time learners to the Education Bill Committee in the Commons in March 2011.

The session can be viewed here. The OU’s session can be found between 1 hour 30 minutes and 2 hours 14 minutes.

What impact does studying with the OU have on learners? Sometimes the results appear dramatic because of the change in the fortunes of the offenders. In January 1971 among the first students to start studying at the OU were 22 prisoners, the first of many to study at the OU. Many had difficulties that other students did not face. As one Tutor pointed out some years later, it is difficult for a Category A prisoner to set up a rain gauge outside when he has to be handcuffed to a prison officer every day to check the water level. (more…)

The OU has produced many newspapers and magazines over the years. One of them was aimed at staff and students within Social Sciences. It ran between 1998-2010 in print format and according to the person who edited every edition, Dick Skellington, it sought

to engage readers with those realities which make up everyday life. It has championed the involvement of students themselves, questioned government and academic dogma, informed readers of our curriculum and research priorities, and provided a diverse array of short and informative, often amusing, stories, all embellished by fine photographs and illustrations plus contributions from our two highly talented student cartoonists

This is an example of the work of Catherine Pain a cartoonist For Society Matters and now one for the Open University Community Online Platform 

The OU has longed claimed that it supports its learners. In an article subtitled ‘Why doing a PhD is often a waste of time’ the Economist argued that nowadays doctoral students and postdoc contract staff in general and across many countries, are treated as cheap, highly motivated and disposable labour and that this is in part due to the mismatch bwetween the aims of the institutions and those of the students. There is no evidence presented as to whether this can reasonably be applied to the OU.  If you have postgrad or postdoc experiences of the OU which might be in a debate about how far the OU serves the wider society and the extent to which it is customer-focused, do let us know.

Perhaps in response to criticisms such as implied in these cartoons (ie that students were isolated and that the television was a badly-used fad) from early on many OU materials sought to minimalise the overt input of the lecturer and encourage learners to construct their own understandings. 

One cartoon features a couple eating breakfast and has the caption ‘it’s the Open University – we’re having a sit-in’ and the other one shows a woman with a fake television holding up a card stating, ‘The cat sat on the mat’. The caption refers to a conversation between the two men in the background: ‘She reckons with this teaching method she has the problem of illiteracy licked’.

In 1972 the intention of a psychology course film of children talking and teachers at work in schools was for the student to hear ‘not the analysis of a lecturer but the actual voices of teachers, children and parents… the filter of the lecturer’s personality has been effectively removed’. A sociology film made in the same year used a hidden camera in a hostel for ‘mental sub normals’. There was little editing as the aim was that students could form their own opinions and use it as a starting point for discussion. In 1976 Arthur Marwick (Professor of History at the OU) argued that his aim was ‘to leave each piece of film to speak for itself without being overlaid by an intrusive commentary’.

In the last week there has been extensive media coverage of the large numbers of potential students who are unable to obtain a university place following the publication of A’ level results. Prominent amongst that coverage has been David Willets statement that school leavers should consider The Open University (alongside FE colleges and apprenticeships) as an alternative. Meanwhile spokespeople for the OU have also been popping up advocating this course of action. This is likely to contribute to the trend towards younger people signing up for the OU. (more…)