at a meeting entirely separate from the degree ceremony.
The university's degree ceremonies occur throughout the year at various prestigious auditorium venues located throughout England, as well as in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and the Republic of Ireland, including London, Manchester, Birmingham, Ely, Glasgow, Cardiff, Belfast and Dublin. In the year 2018 the OU held 29 degree ceremonies in total. These ceremonies are presided over by a senior academic at the Pro-Vice-Chancellor level or higher, and have the normal formal rituals associated with a graduation ceremony, including academic dress, procession and university mace.
==== Academic dress ====
Academic dress for the Open University is based on the colours blue and gold (yellow). No headwear is worn at degree ceremonies.
In 2000, the Open University was the first to host an online virtual graduation ceremony in the United Kingdom together with an audience at the OU's campus in Milton Keynes. Twenty-six students from eight countries were bestowed their master's degrees in an online graduation ceremony, including, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Tim Berners-Lee, one of the founders of the World Wide Web, who was conferred an honorary doctorate.
=== Rankings ===
The university is included in major world university rankings such as Times Higher Education World University Rankings, U.S. News & World Report and Academic Ranking of World Universities.
The OU ranked in the top third of UK universities in the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2014 using the Times Higher Education Power Score.
The Open University ranked third in National Student Survey 2021 achieving 88.24% for overall student satisfaction.
=== Research ===
Like other UK universities, the OU actively engages in research. The OU's Planetary and Space Sciences Research Institute has become particularly well known to the public through its involvement in space missions. In October 2006, the Cassini-Huygens mission including 15 people from the OU received the 2006 "Laurels …
