Open University ..thoughts?

Hi guys,
Just wondering has anybody used open university before?
How did they find it? Do industries/employers recognise OU courses as seriously as other university's?

Any experiences welcomed.

Thanks

Reuben

My Dad successfully completed a degree in renewable energy and found the experience overwhelmingly positive. OU qualifications should carry the same weight as those from other institutions - the standards are just as high.

Go for it!

My Wife did an OU degree in History and English and is now a Qualified Teacher

History was the foundation module in the first year the rest was English

I believe it is harder than going to university as you only get tutorial support every so often (actually meeting face to face with your assigned tutor) all other help is in the form of praise or criticism on your marked work

It can also be quite bewildering! especially if you get a different tutor half way through as they tend to have different opinions and styles

She qualified with a 2.1 in English literature and Language! also passed as outstanding in her teacher training (salaried) so it was hard work but well worth it

Also it takes over your life my wife was working all day and then studying most evenings

She found it very enjoyable and it has opened up a lot of interest for me too in books and subjects i was never given the opportunity to learn about at school or even heard about

I would say it is worth doing provided you can and will be dedicated enough to devote time to it, if you struggle for spare time its probably not going to be worth doing!

The Mrs did an OU Chemistry nodule. Definitely recommended.

I think the OU has a good reputation too.

No shame in this at all, certainly well-respected. You have the option to spread the course out over time too, but you don't sound as if that would be a priority.

Find the right subject and have lots of patience - could be the turning point you're looking for!

Certainly this, I teach distance learning Engineering HNC/D at a local University so a similar sort of delivery to the OU. The dedication and self-motivation that you'll need is very different to a course with regular face to face contact. I'm not trying to put you off but to help prepare you for that aspect.

Without a doubt it is harder than going to a physical university - in most cases, you're doing a full time job at the same time.

I have both a Batchelor's and a Master's degree from the OU, and have had no issues except with a handful of companies around Cambridge who simply would not consider anyone without an Oxbridge degree, irrespective of experience.

I like the possibility of mix and matching courses for your interests - though beware mixing them too much and ending up without a common thread in your degree - and I like that you can take a break any time. I had a couple of years out from the Master's while they got around to finishing a course I wanted...

I don't like the current prices one bit; part of the joy of OU was that you could afford to take a course simply for interest and a degree-counting course was only about six hundred quid. It's a lot more now. And I definitely don't like all the begging letters that come to alumni.

But that said, if I were bored I'd do another like a shot. Note that there are many courses available at low prices from places like Coursera and Udell (I preferred Coursera) but on the whole while they are excellent academic or specific courses they are not generally recognised by employers except as an indication of interest.

Barnacle, BSc (Open), PGC CCI (Open), MSc CCI (Open) <-- or so they tell me.

Thanks guys. I believe it's going to be my route to a new career.
I still need to work but working on hopefully a 4day working week with a new company.

This should hopefully give me some flexibility to study.
Motivation I believe is key, as I didn't finish my hand due to work pressures and life.

Now we're in the new home next is career. I've been unsettled for some time but with work changes I'm am truly feeling the need to change careers.
I was worried that some industries may not see OU qualifications the same as a university given but seems generally people hAve had no issues.

How does the tutorials /study etc work exactly?

On the negative side you have to be dedicated. I managed 3 units of a Science based degree in the 90s (which at the time would have been a BA) before I lost interest. Not helped by running out of units which interested me.

I wanted to do a history degree, but their idea of history and mine were not the same. Basically it was art or religion based, I wanted to do political history.

Rueben, not sure my experiences are still relevant - they were some time ago.

However, when I did it the usual structure for a course was the delivery of a huge pile of reference books - six or eight inches high - plus a number of forms which had to be filled in and attached to tutor-marked-assessments - TMAs. Those at grad level were generally quite short but happened quite often, every two or three weeks on some courses - the higher level courses had assessments which were not so frequent but a lot harder work; the ones on my dissertation year were all over ten thousand words...

There used to be videos over the TV at odd hours of the night, then that changed to delivery by video tape and then DVD; I suspect now that most lectures will be available over the web (hint, if they are, save as to keep them locally so you don't need to be online!). I also suspect that the TMAs will be submitted over the web too.

I had many arguments/discussions with the OU over their insistence that Windows was required as an OS - there are many courses that have specific applications you have to run locally, which may or may not affect you, and you have to deliver in Word format - I found that LibreOffice was fine. I managed, after much discussion, to deliver my dissertation in pdf form; I wrote it using LyX and LaTeX.

Cheers Neil and others. Defiantly helped.
If I can sort my work arrangements out this maybe a goer. I need work commitments to change as I simply can't commit to it as yet.

I have been a tutor for the OU for the past six years, and have enjoyed every minute of it. The students are keen, and the material is well-thought-out (usually) and interesting. Assessment takes the form of (about) six writing assignments spaced out over the course, and an exam at the end.

Guidance is provided through several media; face-to-face tutorials, of which there are too few, discussion forums on the internet, where an unlimited amount of contact with your tutor is available (depending on the tutor), and the course books, which are reproduced online. Relevant videos and recordings are all on the course website. Finally, if you have a good tutor, you will have ongoing email access to him/her.

Yes, you do need quite a lot of study time, but there is a fair amount of flexibility with submission dates for the required written work.

Let me know if you need any further information.

Having just completed a BSc (hons) a the OU, I would like to point out a couple of things.

1. Their bureaucracy is appalling. Typically, they use their own terminilogy and if you have no idea about the language of academia, tough. It's hard to get any sense out of their office staff.

2. The Student pages are poorly organised. Trying to find the relevant bits of information can be a real challenge. For my final, I could not find out the desired report structure anywhere. I finally found it a link embedded in page two of another link embedded in page 4 of the calendar schedule for the report. They just seem to love hiding things.

3. Unless you are doing something very standard (ie. history, English, Mathematics), you will not leave with the same degree you signed up for unless you can finish it in four-five years. They create and drop the more modern degrees faster than most people can complete them. They will allow you to transfer your points... mostly, but you may have to fight for the rest.

Having said all this, I have no experience of other universities, so I cannot make a comparison.