FEBA Et Al
I must say I concur with FEBA and Mr R, having only one provider for such a course is limiting, to open it out to competition would benefit us all.
Having said that I also agree with No Sig (for a change), it all comes down to commercial viability in the end, if there is not a large enough potential audience for such a course (and a suitable return for the effort involved) then the OU and Oxford wouldn't be interested, I'm sure there are more wanna be pilots for Oxford than wanna be Ops Controllers ......... ??
I did an OU course, god a number of years ago now, probably 10 or more. The material quality, tutor support, content etc were spot on, but the resources of the OU are vast. The efforts of UKOMA and No Sig should be applauded in getting "somebody" to take on the task, however their efforts were marred by the capability and failure of the GCNS to provide not only quality materials, but student support. I state again that I sincerely hope the revised version is better than the first, otherwise steer clear.
If Oxford or the OU could be brought on board I would sign up again tomorrow, but for now I'll sit back and wait.
No Sig, I did see the post reference approvals, a shame that we can't get an approval from the CAA, it would help a lot of people and steer them in the right direction if they really are wanna be Ops Controllers. People like Covec need sound advice on what they should do and to know they are not wasting their time/effort/finances in learning something they don't need. At least C&G (which I have done) and GCNS (The first version I have seen and was appalled) give potential employers an indication of skills learnt, which can then be developed. So from that point of view the GCNS is better than nothing, alas somewhat expensive for what it attempts to provide. C&G is good (or was 15 years ago) but doesn't go quite far enough, GCNS goes a little too far, a middle ground would be nice, maybe GCNS has now found that middle ground, I haven't seen version 2 so I can make no further comment.
Best regards
FG