A UK university offering distance learning taught courses, that are open to people without formal academic qualifications, teaching being by correspondence and online with mostly optional tutorials and for some courses compulsory summer schools. Access to postgraduate research is selective and is primarily taught on campus using traditional methods
In Britain, the Open University is a university that runs degree courses using the radio and television, for students who want to study part-time or mainly at home. OU a British university that teaches adult students mainly in their own homes by means of radio and television programmes and courses of study sent by mail
a British university that is open to people without formal academic qualifications and where teaching is by correspondence or broadcasting or summer school