{"id":9541,"date":"2018-07-10T11:13:58","date_gmt":"2018-07-10T10:13:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ounews.co\/?p=9541"},"modified":"2018-07-10T11:13:58","modified_gmt":"2018-07-10T10:13:58","slug":"house-of-lords-debate-part-time-education-and-the-future-of-the-ou","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/around-ou\/ou-speaks-out\/house-of-lords-debate-part-time-education-and-the-future-of-the-ou\/","title":{"rendered":"House of Lords debate part-time education and the future of the OU"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>The OU\u2019s Chancellor, Baroness Martha Lane-Fox of Soho, led the celebration of the OU\u2019s mission and success in a debate in the House of Lords last week. You can watch the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.parliamentlive.tv\/Event\/Index\/958ff2f8-fec4-46bf-a324-417510ba8e9d\">full debate here<\/a> with the Baroness speaking from 12:27 to 12:31. A <a href=\"https:\/\/hansard.parliament.uk\/Lords\/2018-07-05\/debates\/2DC52A36-38AA-4748-AFF2-16CB79A2A91D\/Part-TimeAndContinuingEducationAndTheOpenUniversity#contribution-65C974DA-AC7E-448F-BD3E-958E144EC66D\">full transcript<\/a> is also available.<\/em><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_8022\" style=\"width: 225px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8022\" id=\"longdesc-return-8022\" class=\"wp-image-8022 \" tabindex=\"-1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Martha-Lane-Fox-e1531215665194.jpg\" alt=\"Chancellor of The Open University, Martha Lane Fox\" width=\"215\" height=\"213\" longdesc=\"https:\/\/ounews.co?longdesc=8022&amp;referrer=9541\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Martha-Lane-Fox-e1531215665194.jpg 425w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Martha-Lane-Fox-e1531215665194-300x298.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Martha-Lane-Fox-e1531215665194-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 215px) 100vw, 215px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-8022\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chancellor of The Open University, Martha Lane Fox<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The Chancellor described the OU as &#8220;an extraordinary and important institution, which we must all continue to support,&#8221; not least in relation to the OU\u2019s open access policy. She talked about the inspiring students she meets at OU graduations who should be classed as double-time learners as opposed to part-time. She referenced the internal challenges of recent times, but was clear that the OU is &#8220;still an innovative place and still has a bold vision for the future.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Chancellor also pointed to the fact that, with the external policy and funding climate in England, it is a tragedy that &#8220;at a time when, more than ever, we need continued learning as part of our culture, there has been such a dramatic fall in part-time learning.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h2>Radical change needed<\/h2>\n<p>Peers rallied round the critical nature of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/publications\/review-of-post-18-education-and-funding-terms-of-reference\">UK Government Post-18 Review<\/a> of education and funding in England in addressing the dramatic decline in part-time numbers, sending a clear message to the Government that a radical change is needed.<\/p>\n<p>The UK Government spokesperson, Viscount Younger of Leckie, said: &#8220;I hope that today noble Lords have been left in no doubt that we hold the OU in high esteem and will continue to support and applaud its successes.&#8221; The Government is due to agree the outcome of the Review in early 2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The OU\u2019s Chancellor, Baroness Martha Lane-Fox of Soho, led the celebration of the OU\u2019s mission and success in a debate in the House of Lords last week. You can watch the full debate here with the Baroness speaking from 12:27 to 12:31. A full transcript is also available. The Chancellor described the OU as &#8220;an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":2176,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[412,1101,1379,1677,1758,2212],"class_list":["post-9541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ou-speaks-out","tag-chancellor","tag-house-of-lords","tag-martha-lane-fox","tag-part-time-study","tag-post-18-review","tag-the-open-university-in-england"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}