The Open University of Great Britain provides home-based instruction to nearly 50,000 predominantly-working students via broadcasts and correspondence. Each unit of instruction consists of a combination of text, broadcasts, cassette recordings, assignments, and experiment kits. The per student cost of this delivery system is impressively low, especially when the large initial capital outlay is divided among large numbers of students. A professional production staff is necessary to maintain these low costs. For the student, broadcasters can act as organizers, synthesizers, pacers, study guides, role models, and recruiters. Professors have been required to master a variety of media techniques, although they are assisted in their course production by specialists trained in the proper mixing of multimedia presentations. (EMH)