{"id":3047,"date":"2018-12-04T21:24:56","date_gmt":"2018-12-04T20:24:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/?p=3047"},"modified":"2018-12-05T10:19:56","modified_gmt":"2018-12-05T09:19:56","slug":"50-objects-for-50-years-no-33-blithering-opponents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/?p=3047","title":{"rendered":"50 objects for 50 years. No 33. Blithering opponents."},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.24.png\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-3049\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.24-300x167.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"489\" height=\"272\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.24-300x167.png 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.24-768x428.png 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.24-1024x571.png 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 489px) 100vw, 489px\" \/><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.05.png\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-3048\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.05-300x167.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"494\" height=\"275\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.05-300x167.png 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.05-768x426.png 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Screenshot-2018-12-04-at-19.43.05-1024x568.png 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 494px) 100vw, 494px\" \/><\/a>The quotations above manage to insult the students (<em>Spectator<\/em>) the founders (Christopher Chataway) the staff (Robert Jackson) the idea (<em>The Times<\/em>) and the Scots, Welsh, Irish and others not based in England (<em>Times Educational Supplement<\/em>). This was a university which failed as:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>it was not a community of scholars, it <i>failed<\/i> as a university<\/li>\n<li>it strove to be a university, it <i>failed<\/i> those best served by technical colleges and adult education provision<\/li>\n<li>\u00a0it used television, it <i>failed<\/i> to educate and only managed to transmit<\/li>\n<li>it was party political, it <i>failed<\/i> to be objective.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These criticisms had an impact. To prove it was intellectually sound the OU made strenuous efforts to present scholarly television programmes. as a result some of them ended up speaking to academic peers, not interested learners. To prove that students were being thoroughly tested to a high standard the OU&#8217;s assessment system has long been rigorous. For many years there were external examiners for every module, not simply every degree and there is checking on the marking of tutors through a system of monitoring and tutorial visits. The accusation that it was the creature of the Labour Party shifted. Some teaching materials were accused of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/?p=2584\" >bias.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>However, slowly, the OU came to make the transition from an \u2018electoral gimmick\u2019 (to quote Chataway) to its current status of \u2018national treasure\u2019 (in the words of the Vice-Chancellor at another university). As it became more popular, so more politicians claimed it as their own. Winnie Ewing, Scottish National Party President 1987\u20132005, suggested that the honorary doctorate she received from the OU in 1993 was \u2018in recognition of my role in establishing it\u2019. One<a href=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/?p=993\" > Liberal<\/a> claimed that, \u2018the idea owes its inception to a meeting at the Liberal Party Council at least a year earlier as any Liberal pamphlet for the year 1962 can amply demonstrate\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The quotations above manage to insult the students (Spectator) the founders (Christopher Chataway) the staff (Robert Jackson) the idea (The Times) and the Scots, Welsh, Irish and others not based in England (Times Educational Supplement). This was a university which failed as: it was not a community of scholars, it failed as a university it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[201,13,44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-50-objects","category-complaints-and-concerns","category-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3047"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3047\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3070,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3047\/revisions\/3070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/History-of-the-OU\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}