You Said, We Did
How your voice has made a difference
This page provides an opportunity to see the valuable feedback received from students across a wide range of communication channels, and to see what the OU has done in response.
Please note this video is now a couple of years old so some people no longer have the same title. The current Students Association leadership can be seen on their website.
Choose a topic from the drop-down list below to see how students can have an impact on their university experience and be empowered to help shape the University. Next time you are asked to give your opinion, you know that the OU is taking this feedback seriously and will respond.
You said...
You struggled with the online delivery of Physics: from classical to quantum (S217).
We did...
We have improved the print-quality PDF files by imbedding QR codes so that a student who chooses to work from printed pages can benefit from faster access to the multimedia resources (notably videos, simulations, and interactive elements).
Physical Sciences
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You said...
You found the Practical science: physics and astronomy (SXPA288) Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) site difficult to navigate and some resources are difficult to locate.
We did...
We have improved the organisation of the Practical science: physics and astronomy (SXPA288) VLE. We have also updated a number of the initial activities and videos to make them more visually engaging and relevant. The project booking system has been simplified and group work has been improved with the use of Adobe Connect for team collaboration.
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You said...
The amount of material covered in TMAs of The quantum world (SM358) is too uneven.
We did...
We have revised TMA1 of The quantum world (SM358) to obtain a more balanced workload.
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You said...
You are dissatisfied with the lack of printed material, chiefly textbooks, in modules that are fully or predominantly presented online.
We did...
We acknowledge the practical value of printed books for a significant fraction of our learners, while embracing the enormous opportunities digital and online material affords for pedagogy, ease of use, topicality and flexibility. Going forward we are investigating how to bring you the best of both worlds, where some good-quality printed material is deployed in support of electronic resources. The balance between these media may be different for different modules, and whilst it is unlikely that the learning resources will become available in full in both formats we pledge that we are not abandoning books for good.
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You said...
There is lack of practical experience via laboratory schools in the curriculum.
We did...
We have added to and improved our OpenScience Laboratory assets, and we are confident that these will become a new benchmark for teaching practical skills at a distance. We are also taking part in a trial opening up the OpenPlus lab schools (at level 1) to Stage 1 students, to assess feasibility for rolling this out more widely.
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You said...
Some regret was expressed about the move away from face to face tutorials.
We did...
Unfortunately, the attendance of face to face tutorials overall has been low. As it is difficult to justify using significant resources for activities that benefit only a minority of our students we believe that recorded online tutorials are a more useful substitute. We continue to review the provision of tuition across our modules and will investigate the feasibility of selected face to face events such as introductory or revision days schools.
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