Fit your degree around your life! (Open University in general)

Member Name: CokaCola

Product:	Open University in general
Date:	04/02/09 (152 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Do it in your own time, not tied down.

Disadvantages: Perhaps you do not cover the material in as much detail?

I recently completed a course called S182 or "Studying Mammals" with the Open University, which I was fortunate enough to pass. In this review, I will discuss the experience I had whilst studying with the Open University, and will cover some of the pros along with some of the cons.

The open University is like a 100% correspondence establishment. You do not go and live there, you don't go there at all really, you simply recieve the material at home and complete it in your own time. I did a science course, but I think the principals for the arts courses is similar. You'll be given some material to study, which might be in the form of a DVD series, a Text book, some articles etc, and you'll have to complete an assesment on them, which you can sometimes submit to the Open University online, or you can Post.

Although my course did not offer any tutorials, the Open University does provide tutorial events in some areas for some courses. These are kind of similiar to a University Lecture I think, but it gives you a little bit more Human assistance.

The course material is not overly difficult, and I think one of the problems with the Open University is that you can look at specifically what the assessment asks of you in advance, and concentrate on studying for that particular area. I feel this is dangerous, because you can still pass even though you have covered hardly any of the information that you would normally cover at University. This is simply my opinion and it may not be true of all courses.

If you want to complete one of the courses, I think it's nice to do one in a subject your already familiar with, as this will make the course quite methodical and enjoyable. On the other hand, you might want to study something completely new, but personally I would worry about teaching myself a maths degree, with no daily tutor to assist me!

Summary: An Interesting new option, and quite a nice way of going into high education.