The Open College Federation of the North West was initiated in 1975 as a result of an agreement between the University of Lancaster, Nelson and Colne Tertiary College, and the Lancashire Polytechnic. Its aims were to prepare adults for entry into higher education, create a range of intermediate-level courses for adults that were academic but that could be taken for interest alone, and develop courses that could improve adults' job prospects. In 1982 the institutions belonging to the federation received a grant to develop an open college unit in distance learning form. A course team approach was adopted to developing learning materials for a course in criminology. Two sets of instructional units, one with integrated study guides and the other with separate guides, were developed and field-tested with 60 individuals (current students in criminology, social sciences, and sociology and inspector trainees from the Lancashire constabulary). The integrated study guides proved to be better and were thus selected for use with 18 students enrolled in a pilot course. The tutors and coordinators who used the materials found them to be excellent and to increase the accessibility and flexibility of the federation's stage B criminology course. (MN)