The OU Students Association’s Community team helps create a welcoming, interesting and fun community for all OU scholars. We do this in a huge number of ways but right now our most high profile annual event is taking place.
Every year we are responsible for selecting the team that represents the OU on BBC Two’s University Challenge. This is possibly the Community team’s most fun job and as the TV show gets audiences of over two million, it’s the biggest exposure that OU students get nationally each year.
The selection process runs throughout the year and we whittle down around 200 applicants to a final five (a team of four plus one reserve) who go for TV auditions in January. We then hope that we’ve picked a good combination of great quizzers and interesting characters with a first class range of general knowledge, who get selected for the TV stage.
The Open University has won University Challenge twice before in 1984 and 1999 and we had high hopes for our 2023/24 team. However you might have heard that the OU team played Hertford College.
Oxford in the first round in early September and sadly lost by 230 to 155. However as one of the highest scoring first round losers they played a second match in late October which they won! So we will keep cheering them on and who knows how far they will get?
We know that for many OU students seeing your peers on TV is a real inspiration and makes you feel a part of something much bigger and this can be a great help in overcoming the feelings of isolation that distance learners might experience.
In many respects the Students Association, and the Community team in particular, are a bit like a tightrope walker’s safety net, in that it may never be used but it’s incredibly reassuring and confidence building just knowing it’s there.
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