Open University - Who's doing it?

stoofa · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:02

Conanius said:
Stoofa,

How have you found B120 for work? What did you end up having to do?

I've got 2 more assessments due for BU130 (TMA03 for a week today and EMA at the beginning of April).

Just curious how you've got on with this as thats what I'm due to start next !

To be honest - not too bad at all. The books on the course are all on a different subject, so you'll study marketing and then you'll get a TMA on it, you'll study finance and then you'll get a TMA on it.
So far of the 4 TMA's only the finance one was a bit of a nightmare - to the point where I sat down with the company accountant for an hour and ran through a few things with him. Other than that it has been not too bad (certainly better than BU130, which I really didn't enjoy).
I'll find out about the EMA on Tuesday next week. I'm told it will be half on Book 5 and then half on either marketing or finance (your choice) - I'll be taking marketing as I just clicked with the subject.

peter · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:08

Has not been finalised but I think there is an upper age limit of 60 for student loans for OU students .
VeNT are you at walton hall now ?

Deiwos · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:16

VeNT said:
if thats true then it would be epic!

The only thing to consider is if you do go the loan route you have to pay the increased fees, £5000 per 120 credits of study. I take it you're above threshold for financial support?

Peter, what department are you in? I'm OU staff too

peter · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:36

Project officer MCT you?

Dist · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:46

DJMK4 said:
How long did it take people to do CCNA through the OU? And how much did it cost?

I can't remember how much it cost as my courses were covered by OU financial support. The course took about 8 months though, like most OU courses. It was a good course IMO, covered everything in good detail (unlike some CCNA courses that some places offer, this teaches the subject matter, not just how to pass the CCNA exam). and the day schools meant I got some hands on time with some cisco hardware.

The course doesn't include the official cisco exam though, so if you take the OU CCNA course you will have to take an additional exam after it to gain your CCNA. As it is a Cisco academy course though if you do well enough you get a 50% off voucher, and continued access as a cisco academy student long after the course has ended.

Deiwos · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:48

peter said:
Project officer MCT you?

Senior SSA in Scotland. Been thinking of applying for some MK jobs, pretty big move if I do though

Spamalot · 2 Mar 2012 at 09:55

Question: Has anyone finished an OU degree and gained significant career progression due to the qualification (I appreciate it's hard to judge this but do your best). I already have a Economics degree and would really like to do the PPE course, although it's unlikely that I'd use it for career progression I would struggle spending £15k for something with no real world value.

VeNT · 2 Mar 2012 at 10:07

peter said:
Has not been finalised but I think there is an upper age limit of 60 for student loans for OU students .
VeNT are you at walton hall now ?

nope

gonna have to look into this I think. if I can get a student loan or funding or something then I'd be mad not to!

peter · 2 Mar 2012 at 13:43

if you work for the ou fees are paid for atm but that may change

Deiwos · 2 Mar 2012 at 14:38

peter said:
if you work for the ou fees are paid for atm but that may change

Yep, you can get staff fee waiver, depending on where you work/what your contract is.

Is your missus Vent declared on council tax etc? I'm pretty sure when it comes to applying for FS there's little they can do when it comes to proving household income other than the evidence you provide.

DJMK4 · 2 Mar 2012 at 21:43

Dist said:
I can't remember how much it cost as my courses were covered by OU financial support. The course took about 8 months though, like most OU courses. It was a good course IMO, covered everything in good detail (unlike some CCNA courses that some places offer, this teaches the subject matter, not just how to pass the CCNA exam). and the day schools meant I got some hands on time with some cisco hardware.

The course doesn't include the official cisco exam though, so if you take the OU CCNA course you will have to take an additional exam after it to gain your CCNA. As it is a Cisco academy course though if you do well enough you get a 50% off voucher, and continued access as a cisco academy student long after the course has ended.

Might aswel just go for the CCNA then surely? or do you mean you have the course and sit the exam, 8 months seems a while, I was hoping more like 4-5 months

Dist · 3 Mar 2012 at 01:01

DJMK4 said:
Might aswel just go for the CCNA then surely? or do you mean you have the course and sit the exam, 8 months seems a while, I was hoping more like 4-5 months

If I remember right, the CCNA course is a 60 point level 2 course, which is why it is spread out over the Feb to Sept/Oct sort of timeline like other level 2 or 3 courses.

The way it works is over that time you work your way through the official Cisco Academy course materials and every so often complete an Open University TMA, and go to 4 day schools (spread out over the duration of the course). At the end of the course you will take an OU exam that will give you your OU result for the course, and credit towards any OU qualifications you are going for.

At the same time as this you also do 4 cisco exams as part of the cisco academy (1 at each day school). These have no impact on your OU course result in any way, all that happens is if you pass all 4 with sufficient score you get a 50% off voucher for when you take the real Cisco exam at a proper exam center (which has nothing to do with the OU).

If you want there is nothing stopping you rushing through all of the course material on the cisco academy in a month and then just taking the offical cisco exam, but if you want OU course credit or the cisco academy vouchers you will have to submit the OU TMAs and do the day schools on their time schedule.

Simply put, the point of the course is to take you from knowing nothing all the way to having a good understanding of the CCNA material, and provide course credit towards a qualification. After the course it is up to the student to put that knowledge to use and do the official Cisco exam.

Conanius · 11 Mar 2012 at 08:55

stoofa said:
To be honest - not too bad at all. The books on the course are all on a different subject, so you'll study marketing and then you'll get a TMA on it, you'll study finance and then you'll get a TMA on it.
So far of the 4 TMA's only the finance one was a bit of a nightmare - to the point where I sat down with the company accountant for an hour and ran through a few things with him. Other than that it has been not too bad (certainly better than BU130, which I really didn't enjoy).
I'll find out about the EMA on Tuesday next week. I'm told it will be half on Book 5 and then half on either marketing or finance (your choice) - I'll be taking marketing as I just clicked with the subject.

Thanks for the reply Stoofa, appreciated. What sort of word length are the various TMA's, and by 'Books' are we talking like the 'reflective learning' book in BU130 (A4, 40-50 pages) or a real book, 2-3-400 pages?

I'll be calling them on Monday to book in.

On a totally different note, has anyone else picked their transitional qualification? As I understand it, we need to do this in order to 'confirm' our current fees.... ?

Conanius · 11 Mar 2012 at 09:06

Spamalot said:
Question: Has anyone finished an OU degree and gained significant career progression due to the qualification (I appreciate it's hard to judge this but do your best). I already have a Economics degree and would really like to do the PPE course, although it's unlikely that I'd use it for career progression I would struggle spending £15k for something with no real world value.

I'm doing my degree for two reasons.

1 - I didn't really work hard enough at school and as such struggle with putting together hugely complicated written documents in a concise fashion. Sure, I've written SLA's/OLA's in my previous role as a Service Delivery Manager, but I just wasn't happy with my written work. We have lots of 'political' writing we have to do as I've progressed through the ranks at work, and I think I look weak in this area. I was told doing this work would 'look good' when it came to promotion boards. Early days as I only started late last year, but in doing the course I'm committed to my current employer for course length + 1 year after completion. They can't be disappointed I'm saying I want to be there long term, especially in the current climate.

2 - Experience is great. I've got nearly 10 years experience working in Service Management. Have you tried looking at job adverts for major (and I mean major) multinationals. Especially overseas. No degree? HR sift you out. You could have the perfect skills to be a Senior IT Manager/whatever and get sifted out just because 10 years ago you didn't get a 2:1 in Catering. I'm keen to consider emigrating, and a degree will help me have enough points to do this.

With you already having a degree, it wipes out my comments for why it might help me. Who knows though, I know MBA's are lapped up by big consultancy firms though, so I cant see that as a poor investment. I fancy doing one of those after this course.

JHeaton · 12 Mar 2012 at 11:54

Deiwos said:
Hello OU students! I work for the OU in one of the academic support teams (basically I help people choose modules/degrees plus a bunch of other stuff) so if anyones got any questions let me know

Not sure it will be something you can answer, but does financial support from the OU (under the old fees) have any impact on eligibility for student loans if you want to go on to study at another university rather than stay with the OU?

ps3ud0 said:
Starting in May myself on an Open degree, hopefully going to cover Maths, Comp Sci, Chinese and Design courses. Got this month to get a better idea - will ring my advisor next week...

ps3ud0

Awesome, glad to see you've decided to go ahead with it. Hope you enjoy it.

VeNT · 13 Mar 2012 at 08:48

would you guys recommend doing a foundation course first?
I've not done any "academic" quals since GCSE (went Btec/C&G at college and even then didn't really have to work for them).
Little bit worried that diving into a degree would be a bit overwhelming!

JHeaton · 15 Mar 2012 at 14:23

VeNT said:
would you guys recommend doing a foundation course first?
I've not done any "academic" quals since GCSE (went Btec/C&G at college and even then didn't really have to work for them).
Little bit worried that diving into a degree would be a bit overwhelming!

I suppose it depends, really. I've started out with MU123 and although it's taking a bit of time to get used to writing the solutions out properly, the content isn't too much to be working on in the evenings. It might be an idea to start out with one of the more introductory modules to help ease you in to things.

Deiwos · 15 Mar 2012 at 14:43

JHeaton said:
Not sure it will be something you can answer, but does financial support from the OU (under the old fees) have any impact on eligibility for student loans if you want to go on to study at another university rather than stay with the OU?

As far I'm aware it doesn't affect it however you're best double checking with the Student Loans Company. One thing to bear in mind is ELQ (Equivalent Level Qualifications) which basically means if you do say 120 credits with the OU you could possibly only get 240 credits of further support (2 years of full time study) with another Uni. It certainly works this way for students joining the OU from another Uni in England (it's different in Scotland and other countries I believe) so it might work the other way around. Like I said, best to ask SLC I think.

VeNT, if you're not sure what to start your studies with, drop me an email in trust and I'll go through it with you. That aspect of things is part of my job so I'm pretty well qualified to help you on it

drunkenmaster · 16 Mar 2012 at 05:56

THought I'd bump this with a question and a reminder. Reminder first, I think everyone should have gotten an e-mail about declaring a degree and keeping transitional fee's, meaning you can pay current module pricing for the length of your degree as long as you declare your degree and do a few other bits before the end of August... afaik declaring as an "open" degree is fine, meaning you can do what you want anyway.

Secondly, a question, I didn't realise that a 1st seems to require a way higher average than standard, 70% for most uni's afaik, while the OU needs 85% average for TMA's and a 85% mark in the exam.

I'm quite a bit above that.... so far, and thought I was cruising to a first(with a 70%+ counting) but 85% will be a bit mental.

Do employers classify a first from the OU as better than most other places?

meghatronic · 16 Mar 2012 at 06:29

drunkenmaster said:
Secondly, a question, I didn't realise that a 1st seems to require a way higher average than standard, 70% for most uni's afaik, while the OU needs 85% average for TMA's and a 85% mark in the exam.

You're confusing degree classification with modules.

The modules grades you get are weighted based on the level and combined to calculate the classification of a degree.

Read: http://www.open.ac.uk/student-policies/objects/d3420.pdf