Open to Success: Evaluating the impact of the Open Learning Champions project in Scotland

Abstract

The Open Learning Champions project has been running in Scotland since 2016, with the aim of increasing access to higher education by using Open Educational Resources (OER). The project involves partnering with voluntary and community organisations to engage disadvantaged learners who may be very distant from higher education, with often long and complex journeys into formal study. Evaluating the impact of this pre-access intervention has been a challenge as the university has no direct relationship with the learners, and learner journeys from OpenLearn into OU study are tracked in different ways on each platform. In a recent evaluation of the project, the authors used a mixed-methods approach, drawing on a range of qualitative and quantitative data gathered over five years to tell the story of the project's impact.