Open and shut case?

Openness at the OU is not as simple a matter as it appears, but one which requres critical understanding. There are hidden connections with what seem to be the opposite of openness – conventional processes of selection that supposedly hve been abolished and closure of access to occupations … In effect a selection policy has been developed.

David Harris, ‘Openness and closure in distance education’, Falmer Press, London, New York and Philadelphai, 1987, pp. 14-15.

Was this the case then? Or now?

Openness was always about more than access, but the framework has shifted with the spread of the web as Terry Foote of  Wikipedia noted when he said: ‘Openness: imagine a world in which every single person is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge.That’s what we’re doing’.

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