Care experienced students are provided with specific support to study with The Open University in Scotland.
We know that many care experienced students have faced challenges in accessing higher education and in managing their studies alongside everything else going on in their lives.
The definition of care experience the OU uses is 'anyone of any age, who at any stage in their life has been in care. This can be for any length of time and includes a variety of settings, such as in residential children’s home, kinship care, foster care, or through living at home under a supervision order. It also includes adopted children who were previously looked after'.
As a distance learning university we offer a unique student experience. You don’t need to move away from home and you can study at a time and a pace that works for you. You can choose to study for a degree, diploma or certificate, or take a stand-alone module. We provide supported, personalised learning.
If you are care experienced The Open University in Scotland offers you:
We provide guidance on funding, including:
Updating your student profile:
If you have registered for OU study, to ensure you receive information about funding and support for care experienced students, please tell us that you have care experience by updating your OU student profile as follows:
Receiving newsletter for care experienced students:
Our OU Scotland Cares Team send newsletters to care experienced students which include information about study support, financial support, events and opportunities. You will receive notification about the newsletter and opportunities available if you have declared your care experience in your student profile or when you register on a module. Most recent edition: January 2025 newsletter (PDF, 455 KB).
All universities and colleges in Scotland are named corporate parents, responsible for upholding the rights and safeguarding the wellbeing of care experienced students. We take our responsibilities as a corporate parent seriously. More information on how we support care experienced students is in our Corporate Parenting Plan (PDF, 631 KB).
We are always keen to hear from our care experienced students and those who are interested in studying with us about how we can improve their learning experience with us.
We also work in partnership with other organisations to better understand the needs of care experienced students, and to ensure that resources to fully support care experienced students are developed.
For example, we offer Corporate Parenting in Higher Education, a free short online module for staff at all universities in Scotland. The course was developed with Who Cares Scotland? and care experienced students (pictured), to help improve support for care experienced students. It was also adapted by the College Development Network to provide a Corporate Parenting in Colleges course.
Our named contact for people with care experience is Ewe (pictured). Email the OU Scotland Cares Team and Ewe will be happy to help.