I am delighted to see Mr. Wagner's article on this subject (Vol. 1, No. 2,, and I entirely agree with his main conclusion about the cost advantage of the Open University system. It would be extraordinary if it were otherwise. However, his article might be carelessly used to support certain myths about higher education: so I hope that he will excuse this footnote.
A university does not exist solely to provide courses, or to give qualifications after examination. In its teaching function, it exists to provide an educational experience. The comparison in Mr. Wagner's paper is between two quite different kinds of educational experience: one full-time, involving close relations with other students in a wide range of activities, free from the pressures of earning a living and from most other responsibilities; the other requiring the dedicated use of spare time, in a life subject to the discipline of other responsibilities. I am not saying which educational experience is "better" -each is probably appropriate for particular individuals. But they are not the same, and Mr. Wagner's remark that "the output of the Open University is planned to be similar to that of conventional universities" might give currency to the false belief that those who can pass the same examination have had the same education.
In making the actual cost comparisons, Mr. Wagner quite unnecessarily slants the case in favour of the Open University. First, he appears to have used expenditure in conventional universities for all students, including the very expensive subjects (such as medicine) which the Open University could not conceivably provide. Second, the allowance for research costs proposed on page 162 appears to be shunted into a footnote on page 170 and thereafter forgotten. But that allowance is probably in any case inadequate: what is in question is an allowance for nonteaching activities, and a careful study of the budgets of conventional universities will show these to be much more significant than Mr. Wagner