The Open University

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Different strokes for different folks etc but the idea of studying / exams doesn't float my boat anymore.
My dad did his degree with OU back in the late 70's with 4 kids and full time job with overtime every weekend.
I would of liked him to maybe spend more time playing with us than studying
Time and a place
 
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JJH said:
Different strokes for different folks etc but the idea of studying / exams doesn't float my boat anymore.
My dad did his degree with OU back in the late 70's with 4 kids and full time job with overtime every weekend.
I would of liked him to maybe spend more time playing with us than studying
Time and a place
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I'll be a 24 year old living in a flat by myself so other than work / gym if I don't fill my time doing something I'll end up on the drink all the time in the town. Also I don't want to spend the rest of my days earning 8-9 pound an hour.
 
FishburnMackem said:
I'll be a 24 year old living in a flat by myself so other than work / gym if I don't fill my time doing something I'll end up on the drink all the time in the town. Also I don't want to spend the rest of my days earning 8-9 pound an hour.
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Good on you mate. Not sure how much (little) you earn, but there's the option on a circa £9k loan and then part time work around. Obviously no good for loads of people. Good luck either way.
 
It can be easier to study with the OU as they hold your hand more than traditional universities do, in terms of helping you to plan your study time and how much time you should spend on various activities. That can be useful if you are not particularly good at time keeping, but you do need a lot of self discipline to stick to the stated timetable.

Another good aspect is that you have the end of unit exam questionss or CMA questions pretty much from the start of each unit, which means that you can highlight relevant information for each question as you read through the course notes and carry out the course activities.

There's a fair bit of support online in the course forums if you are lucky, which you should be at Level 1 at least. So stuff that you don't understand, someone else will know all about it, or if it seems that there is universal confusion then the course tutors can step in to clear up misunderstandings.

I very much doubt that you would be able to complete the degree in three years though as it's a huge amount of work. Good luck with it.
 
FishburnMackem said:
Has anyone studied at the open uni whilst working a full-time job?


I am due to start a 42hr job in 2 week’s time and want to also study a BA Open Hons in Politics & Economics at the same time however the open uni have recommended a study duration of 6 years (16-18 hours per week).


I was hoping to complete it in the standard 3-year time frame which would equate to 32-36 hours per week but understand that would be considerably tough if the study hours are accurate.


Anyway I guess the question I am asking is if anyone on here has studied with them whilst working full time, what was your experience regarding how long it took you and how difficult it was? Is it unlikely that working full time & completing a degree within 3 years is a realistic target? I imagine it would depend on the individual, their intelligence and the difficulty of the degree so I am just looking for advice really.
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The place I was working before I was made redundant, we had apprentices studying part-time whilst working full time at their jobs. The apprentices were allowed to work 4 days a week with the remaining weekday being for college attendance. However, they were made to work two hours a day extra on the remaining four days to make up their full-time hours. I don’t think other companies required their apprentices to make up the time.


As the job was directly relevant to their studies, one complemented the other. One lass got a 1st and another was on course for a 2:1. A lad also got a 2:1 and bailed, though the likelihood is because he didn’t stay a prerequisite time after finishing his studies he would have had to refund part of the fees paid by the company for the course. However, that depended upon the apprentices concerned putting in the hours outside work to study.


Other apprentices didn’t seem to cope so well and drooped out to take shop floor jobs on reaching HNC or HND stage. The hours didn't suit everybody.


Also, way back, my course at Uni. had both full-timers and part-timers on day release. All but one of the eleven full-timers successfully completed their course. The eleven (I think) part-timers had a higher attrition rate due partially to trying to balance work, study and family. In two cases, work ordered the lads concerned onto other training, making it impossible for them to continue after the second year.


I think also marks were generally higher amongst full-timers, although that said full-time and part-time produced two 1st class degrees each. One of the part-timers already had a 1st class degree in another subject, so she already knew the score so to speak.


The big difficulty of working full-time and studying part-time is balancing work, study and family. Work and family always come first with study being fitted in where you can.


You want to complete your studies within the full-time frame whilst working full-time also. That just isn't going to happen as you need typically to fit in typically 10 hours and up to 12 hours a day around you 42 hours a week at work. Even the 6-year schedule the Open University suggests 3 hours a day once you get home from work and will be a tough schedule to follow. That said, if you show discipline and maturity, you might just be able to manage this part-time schedule.


You have a maximum 16 years to complete an Open University degree, so extending it out to say 8 or 9 years may be a better option.


Other questions I have hinted at in the above.


1) Are your studies relevant to your job? This makes fitting in study easier.


2) How demanding is your job and is overtime a significant, regular occurrence?


3) What is your home life like and how amenable is your family to you studying at home and not paying attention to them? A young family can be a significant diversion.


Due to recent redundancy, I've been looking at various study options myself in order to reskill. Full-time masters, part-time masters and Open University study are the options I’ve been considering. In my case, the part-time options would allow me to take up work should I find a job, however, may trap me back in a career I'm trying to escape from even with me studying another subject. The full-time option would hopefully allow a quick kill of the situation, with me being able to field a new set of skills within a year.


Against all options is whilst I've been working and also now out of work, I've got very used to coming home via the gym and just crashing out. Having done the study gig at degree plus some other extra, I don't know if I can go back to studying all hours. I have to factor in family reasons also as a return to study would mean me also ignoring them whilst I study. I don’t know if I can do that to them again. But that also means me being stuck back in the career I'm trying to escape.


I also have a lot to think about.


Hope my ramblings help you gain perspective though.

FishburnMackem said:
Lucky the job I am starting is in a call centre then ;):cool:
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:lol:

becs said:
I did a BA Hons while working part time and being a Mam. My third child was born in the middle of it. I wrote half an assignment while I was in labour and finished it off after I'd given birth :lol:

You need be very focused on managing your time and your diary and make sure you actually do the work and keep up. It is possible to do it but you have to be very dedicated. Only you can decide if that is something you can do.
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Well said, the hours I did were horrendous even as a full-time student, both undergrad and particulalry post-grad. I can't even imagine the part-time pressures.
 
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There's a lot of bad info on this thread mind. I'm at the end of a 6 year slog with just the dissertation left for an honours degree in natural sciences. I've did it whilst working full time just to appease the inner geek and hopefully open some doors down the road potentially.

I've enjoyed it, but it's incredibly difficult at level 3. Make no mistake, the hours you put in, if you're going for a first or a 2:certainly, are insane.

Things have changed an awful lot even since I started. No face to face tutorials, nearly all module materials are now read online as opposed to physical books, all against the backdrop of the scrapping of the old fee system.

Oh, and the OU thresholds for classification have always been way higher....

85% + for a distinction
70 - 84% for a grade 2 pass
55 - 69% for a grade 3 pass
40 - 54% for a grade 4 pass

Theres a convoluted formula for working out your grade, but essentially you need at least 60/120 distinction credits at level 3 for a first, assuming you have a mixture of distinctions and grade 2 at level 2.

Level 1 modules don't count towards final classification.

Good luck!!
 
Having just completed stage 1 for my BEng (design) with the OU, I've decided to shelve it and go full time instead. There's absolutely no way I'll achieve the grades I reckon i'm capable of while trying to balance time around shift work/ family commitments etc.

Don't mean to be disrespectful about your job but if you're starting in a call centre, you can get that type of work anytime you want. Those jobs are ubiquitous. If you really want to complete a degree in three years, go full time with a local university. There's lots of support available.

Best of luck whatever you do, don't fall behind and stick with it!
 
moshpit said:
I started off the astrophysics route but will graduate in biology mate. Did a fantastic L2 module (SK277) which totally altered how I wanted to progress.

You can do an open degree too which essentially lets you choose any module at all. Loads of people do that.
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I'm itching to do a Physics degree but shit scared I'll cry when they start throwing pages full of Calculus and matrices at me. Also not sure which course to do. Everyone says go for STEM but there's so many others it's hard to choose.
 
Dagzd1973 said:
I'm itching to do a Physics degree but shit scared I'll cry when they start throwing pages full of Calculus and matrices at me. Also not sure which course to do. Everyone says go for STEM but there's so many others it's hard to choose.
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Start off with s104... Introduction to science. If ya gonna do physics, which I love, ya have to do the early maths modules to prepare you for level 3. I fucked up and missed a module at level 1 hence the 'easier' decision to switch to bio.
I did complete the astrophysics and astronomy/cosmology modules at level 2 (S282 and S283), which get you a formal qualification and certificate in astronomy. Brilliant courses those, the maths was quite intense but I enjoyed it. However the jump up in maths at level 3 physics is huge hence the need to do the background modules earlier.
 
TexasMackem said:
Don't mean to be disrespectful about your job but if you're starting in a call centre, you can get that type of work anytime you want. Those jobs are ubiquitous. If you really want to complete a degree in three years, go full time with a local university. There's lots of support available.
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Absolutely this.
 
Currently half-way through a BSc in Mathematics and Physics at OU at the moment.

From what I've done so far, onto a decent score (on the border between a first and a 2:1 at the moment), so if I keep them scores up for the last few modules I'll get a decent degree.

Probably could have done an extra module per year and got through it quicker but I'd have been under more pressure and my marks wouldn't have got as high (plus, crucially, my grasp of the subject itself wouldn't have been so good) so I think you are better off not attempting to take too much on if you are working full time at the same time

TexasMackem said:
Don't mean to be disrespectful about your job but if you're starting in a call centre, you can get that type of work anytime you want. Those jobs are ubiquitous. If you really want to complete a degree in three years, go full time with a local university. There's lots of support available.
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This depends on your lifestyle. If you can bear to survive on the bare minimum of money for a few years in return for finishing your degree quicker then go for it. Personally I'd prefer having money than not having it.
 
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moja said:
@TexasMackem So you'll be doing T207 from October?
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No mate, I'm going to Sunderland uni to do a 3 year degree in electronic & electrical engineering instead. I scraped through MST124 & MST125, only because I found the workload difficult to manage. At this stage of my life, struggling through T207 and having it count towards my overall grade wouldn't make sense. Sunderland uni took completion of stage one as my foundation year. I'll revisit it (or do whatever replaces T207 - Oct is last intake)at some point in the future.

Trauntrian said:
This depends on your lifestyle. If you can bear to survive on the bare minimum of money for a few years in return for finishing your degree quicker then go for it. Personally I'd prefer having money than not having it.
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I've secured an £8,200 maintenance loan, a £2,000 per year scholarship (just for doing engineering) and I'm keeping my job on a part time evenings Mon-Thurs basis which offers unlimited overtime. Plus I'm a 38 year old bloke so spending all my money on booze and drugs is behind me.

I reckon I'll be more than ok.
 
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TexasMackem said:
I've secured an £8,200 maintenance loan, a £2,000 per year scholarship (just for doing engineering) and I'm keeping my job on a part time evenings Mon-Thurs basis which offers unlimited overtime. Plus I'm a 38 year old bloke so spending all my money on booze and drugs is behind me.

I reckon I'll be more than ok.
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Don't forget to check their website to see if you qualify for any other bursaries. You'll get a free bus pass first year, depending on your circumstances you can get a £1000 per year bursary too.
 
When I went to Durham as a mature student a few years back (aged 27) I received something called the 'Durham Grant', which was basically 3k per academic year, non-repayable bursary as local, mature student. When I added that to my student loan/grant I was earning around 11k a year tax free for being at uni - plus casual work of a couple of grand and was bringing in about 13k tax free. You wouldn't get that at any entry level call centre (or any entry level job anywhere). So it really depends on what job you'd be surrendering.
 
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