I’m writing this very brief note to explain how I feel about the Open University and their approach to exams and the people that are ‘allowed’ to resit following an initial failure. I’m writing it now in an attempt to avoid the ‘well he would say that, he failed again’ comments were I to post after my predicted (second) failure.
The background to this is the OU’s course B823 – Managing Knowledge. I started this course last November in the hope that it would give me some underpinning knowledge and understanding of the field of Knowledge Management. It culminated in an exam in April this year…that I failed.
I failed by 5%, gaining 35% when the pass mark is 40%. I was a little surprised (not a lot) as I didn’t feel uncomfortable after the exam…I’d answered all the questions and had not finished desperately early; I’d left out some of the more modern thinking picked up from Dave Snowden and similar people (as I’d been told to by the tutor in his comments on my second TMA. Obviously though, my underpinning knowledge and understanding was not as deep as I’d thought is was.
Heigh ho, I thought…I’ll find out where I’d gone astray…you know, her some feedback, brush up where I need to and resit, hopefully second time being lucky. Ah, says the OU, we don’t do that, you can’t have that feedback…it’s not our policy (check their FAQs).
Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever played Mastermind? That game where one player makes up a pattern of four coloured pegs and the second play has to guess that pattern. At each go, the guesser is given feedback with black and white pegs that tell you if you have selected correct colours and whether the colours are in the correct position. I wasn’t too bad at that game, though not at all perfect (it’s not as easy as it sounds for those of you that haven’t played).
Anyway, the point of that reference is that re-revising for an exam when you have no feedback regarding where you went wrong is a little like playing Mastermind but without the black and white pegs. That’s ok thinks I, I’ll join in the exam preparation discussion on the B823 FirstClass forum and I’ll scan the books and the combination should give me an inkling of where I went wrong.
Oh no says OU, you can’t have access to the current B823 fora, you can’t even have access to your old forum…we will let you have access to the previous exam preparation forum, but that’s it…so now they have taken away one eye…I am revising 1/2 blind.
Ok, the tutor…nope…no tutor information…you’re on your own! Fully blind.
Well, there is a dim haze, I have my TMAs and I have the course books that it seems I must re-read in their entirety…something I don’t have time for. Work were very happy to allow me study time first time round, but as I failed and am resitting, they have not been as generous.
So, I have my exam tomorrow…I have done some revision, it’s not been very successful I don’t think. Like many students, I feel I know nothing and I do fully expect to fail the exam once more.
I will take some solace in Dave Snowden’s view of ‘certification’ in KM:
I have a passion for KM as one of the first disciplines that used properly puts people first and is itself a learning environment which should encourage diversity. That passion means that I will fight attempts to standardise or "certify" the discipline. Dave Snowden Founder & Chief Scientific Officer – Cognitive Edge
I too am passionate about KM, or rather the management of knowledge and I don’t think I don’t understand modern KM, I just think I am not academically minded enough to pass the exam.
Thanks for your time, and now it’s back to the books and a drop of wine (rather than dancing, which as you know is my other passion).
Markaich's Blog 