Open University
university in Milton Keynes, UK
The Open University (OU) is a public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by number of students. The majority of the OU's undergraduate students are based in the United Kingdom and principally study off-campus; many of its courses (both undergraduate and postgraduate) can also be studied anywhere in the world. There are also a number of full-time postgraduate research students based on the 45 ha (110-acre) university campus at Walton Hall in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, where they use the staff facilities for research, as well as more than 1,000 members of academic and research staff and over 2,500 administrative, operational and support staff.
The OU was established in 1969 and was initially based at Alexandra Palace, north London, using the television studios and editing facilities which had been vacated by the BBC. The first students enrolled in January 1971. The university administration is now based at Walton Hall, but has administration centres in other parts of the United Kingdom. It also has a presence in other European countries. The university awards undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, as well as non-degree qualifications such as diplomas and certificates or continuing education units. It also offers unique Open Degrees, in which students may study any combination of modules across all subjects.
With around 200,000 students including around 34% of new undergraduates aged under 25 and more than 8,599 overseas students, it is the largest academic institution in the United Kingdom (and one of the largest in Europe) by student number, and qualifies as one of the world's largest universities. Since it was founded, more than 2.3 million students have studied with the Open University.
“Open University” enters the record as university in Milton Keynes, UK. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what University, university and Milton can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Open University” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, University, university and Milton provides the most credible route into that argument.
The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 6, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2413375. VIAF identifies the subject as 177149196535074792131. The Library of Congress control number is n79032959. Authority coordinates are 52.025, -0.706. 3 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1969 and 1971.
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This entry incorporates text from “Open University” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.