Jay Rixon and Gina Sharp, part of the Open Programme team, and Matthew Taylor, a Library Archivist, share their reflections on creating an online exhibition to celebrate 50 years of The Open University’s innovative curriculum. Jay starts the conversation…
On the 22nd May 2019, my colleagues and I celebrated 50 years of the Open Programme in the year that The Open University celebrated 50 years – I’ll admit that seems like a long time ago now and so much has happened since then. However, that 50th birthday was a significant milestone for the Open Programme, and we did not want to let it pass without marking it in some way – so a few colleagues have been working on what you might call a passion project, and we now proudly present to you the Open Programme Exhibition, in partnership with The Open University’s Digital Archive.
Did you know that the fantastic OU Library has a collection of online exhibitions? They have such topics as The History of the OU, Shakespeare and a historical tour of the OU (find out more here).
The chance to create an exhibition around the Open Programme was a rather special chance not to be missed. This exhibition celebrates the Open Qualifications and Modules, as well as the colleagues who have worked on it and most importantly our students.
We wanted to recognise the value and benefits of studying across subjects either in a multidisciplinary or interdisciplinary approach and some of the developments over the years that have all come under the Open Programme ‘umbrella’.
The exhibition has been presented in themes, covering the past, present and future.
- Introduction
- Innovative curriculum design
- Value of multi/interdisciplinary study
- A community of brave learners
To produce this exhibition, we dug into the archives exploring historic papers on the Open Programme. We particularly liked the images of the old, typed text from long-ago meetings. We also found recordings of key topics discussed and a timeline to show how the Open Programme has developed from the only degree the OU offered in the early days to the present day when we have a suite of qualifications and modules. We have videos of colleagues presenting new developments, and animations presenting the qualifications and modules. I also want to comment on the wonderful work by Bryan Mathers visually presenting the Open Programme – this exhibition is elevated by having his illustrations included.
I have enjoyed finding the assets to include in the exhibition, linking out to some of the helpful resources we have like the free Badged Open Course (BOC) Multidisciplinary study: the value and benefits and the Land of Student Engagement and Belonging, as well as mentions of Student Hub Live.
We have been working with a colleague from the OU Digital Archive, Matthew Taylor, and below he shares some insights on the process of presenting and curating an exhibition. “With our Digital Archive exhibitions, we try to provide a concise overview of the subject at hand. The aims are to begin to tell a story that might not be familiar to all, or to highlight some of the fascinating historical audio-visual content held within the University Archive, or to act as a platform from which to direct users to more detailed parts of the collection and other relevant locations. Hopefully with the Open Programme exhibition we’ve been able to achieve all three.”
An Open Programme team member, Gina Sharp (Stakeholder Engagement Manager) comments on her experiences of producing this exhibition. “Taking on the project management of this exhibition has been eye-opening to say the least! Looking back over 50 years of the Open Programme has really impressed upon me the breadth and depth of what is offered to students through this programme. Now that I am fortunate enough to have the opportunity to study for a degree there was only one possible choice for me, and I am therefore now a proud Open Degree student!”
The purpose of the exhibition is to celebrate the history, development, and value of the multidisciplinary ‘Open’ qualifications over the past half-century. We hope you will enjoy reading about the evolution of this programme and perhaps be encouraged to explore it for yourself!