Developing systems thinking in practice capabilities at The UK’s Open University
Submitted by Ray Ison – Professor of Systems – Applied Systems Thinking in Practice (ASTiP) Program

Systems education has been designed and presented at the UK’s Open University (OU) since 1972; nearly 50k students have studied some Systems. In the OU producing a course, or module, involves investment between £0.25 and £1 million. We present a distance-taught MSc (including Certificate and PG Dip) in Systems Thinking in Practice (STiP). Many resources related to the topic, often free, can be found on the OU’s OpenLearn and FutureLearn platforms.  We are also working with employers and the UK Institute for Apprentices, a government body. For the first time ever, there will be Master’s Level Apprenticeship in Systems Thinking, hopefully operational by mid 2019. In this poster you will see our thoughts on an action research program with our students, alumni and their employers to better understand the uptake of, and constraints to, STiP in the work place.
This poster was submitted by Ray Ison (ray.ison@open.ac.uk), who was not able to join today, but who would love to connect to share the breadth of work the Open University is doing in this area.