About Open Universities

Arab Open University

http://aou.org.sa/en/index.php

The Arab Open University can be found on the given URL. The site appears to be well designed and well organised. The site contains all types of information for students, be it academic calendar or courses being offered. There is also a page for frequently asked questions. The site structure appears to be very simple and user friendly. It’s not very difficult for new users to adapt working on this site. The students and teachers need to communicate with each other, students need to find more resources to study, all that is made possible in this site by LMS, e-library, student email and support unit. There is also a link that provides a chance for graduates to look for jobs and submit there CVs online. There are external links to the different branches spread across in the Middle East like Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Bahrain, Kuwait. Also the Open University Validation System is available through an external linkOUVS. The LMS can be further improved by adding an option for direct search of posts through the forums, though there is an option it is not operational or there is some problem in the search facility. Other then that everything seems to be working just fine.

Open University UK

http://www.open.ac.uk/

The UK Open University can be found on the above stated URL. The site for the UK Open University is not as easy to use as the AOU website. The layouts used and the modern designs of the site can be difficult to use for new users. But there is also an option to listen to the site for disabled people. The idea to support the disabled makes it a very good site. The fonts and colours used are consistent and very formal like it should be for any educational website. There are many external links provided by the site like affiliations, validations, awarding body and the membership organisations. The site also provides OU and other general news for the students and staff visiting the site. Graduating students can make use of the job opportunities at the Open University by visiting the Current Vacancies page. The site appears to be very up to date as there is the news section and the vacancies page. The website also provides external links for students across Europe like Austria, Belgium and Denmark. The site can be made more user friendly as not all users can access the site fully because the format seems to be a bit complicated.

Open University of Malaysia

http://www.oum.edu.my/oum/index.php?c=oum&v=main&domid=1⟨=eng