Part Time Learning Works

For fifty-six years The Open University in Scotland has championed widening access to education. Embracing our role as Scotland’s national widening access university, our supported flexible distance learning model and open entry requirements ensure that anyone, regardless of background or circumstances, can purse a degree and/or upskills and reskill in the workplace.

Widening access is at the heart of our social justice mission. We operate in every parliamentary constituency with students from the Borders to Shetland and everywhere in between. Across Scotland, we foster a community of over half a million learners who access free courses on OpenLearn or join our community programmes and events.

We support students to achieve their goals with outcomes that open up new opportunities in life and work. We help employers across public, private and third sectors to develop their workforces and build skills and enterprise. All of this makes a significant contribution to the country’s economic growth and societal wellbeing.

The next Scottish Parliament election is ten months away. Regardless of the outcome of the election the next Scottish Government is facing significant challenges among them:

• Delivering the National Strategy for Economic Transformation with real societal impacts
• Caring for an aging population with increasing demands on the NHS and Social Care systems
• Supporting Scotland’s SMEs to plus skills gaps such as in cyber skills
• Supporting Scotland’s employers to meet the unfilled demand for apprenticeships places
• Delivering the Net Zero transformation with high skills jobs and not warm words

At The Open University in Scotland we set out our stall early publishing our election manifesto (PDF, 671 KB) back in April. We believe the election is an opportunity to choose to take a different approach to supporting part-time students to help meet the challenges outlined above. For too long parliamentarians have primarily focused on the traditional four-year full-time campus-based degree to the detriment of part-time learners.

Education is not linear; people enter higher education at different stages of their lives and may balance work with study, caring responsibilities, or other commitments. It is the flexibility of studying with the Open University that makes us such an attractive and appropriate choice for our students.  
We are calling for the next Scottish Parliament to have a laser focus on part-time students, prioritising their funding and support. This paradigm shift to lifelong learning should take the form of: 

• The creation of an equitable student financial support system so that part-time students have access to the same allowances, benefits and loans as their full-time peers
• An increase to the threshold for the Part-Time Fee Grant adjusted for inflation, addressing the fact that it hasn’t altered since its introduction in 2013
• The creation of a new Fund to support employers and employees looking to upskill and re-skill

In publishing our manifesto so early we wanted to engage not just with MSPs but also with the political parties as they develop their own manifestos ahead of the election. It has also given us a platform from which to respond to the Scottish Government’s consultation on ‘Support for Part-Time Study and Disabled Students’. We welcome the consultation particularly as we’ve been consistently calling for greater support for part time students for the past few years.  

The Part-Time Fee Grant, for instance, is one of the lasting achievements of the parliament with a legacy of students undertaking life changing education. You can read our students’ case stories on our website to see the positive impact the grant has had on students. 

The £25k personal income threshold at which students can receive the grant hasn’t however increased since its introduction in 2013. This has led to a significant drop in numbers of students receiving the grant as salaries have sought to keep up with inflation during the cost-of-living crisis. In turn reducing the opportunity to undertake life changing education for many. We hope that will change as a result of the consultation being held by the Scottish Government. They are seeking the views of past, current and future students so make sure you have your say before the consultation closes on 9 October 2025.     

As we look forward to the next parliamentary term, we want to see a focus on supporting part-time students. Education has changed over the past twenty-five years and the parliament must adapt and innovate to meet the future challenges. Find out more about our manifesto and why Part-Time Learning Works on our website.

5 September 2025