Tensions persist at Eastern Michigan University, where faculty are arguing that the university administration failed to consult with them before signing a deal with a questionable third-party company for marketing online courses. The faculty union expressed concerns that this company will impact the execution of curriculum as well. 
Dr. Judith S. Kullberg
A grievance filed by faculty union members is currently in arbitration. According to the administration, the deal with Academic Partnerships, or AP, a privately-owned Texas-based company, will not involve altering curriculum without the faculty’s input.
The faculty union, however, alleges that the agreement signed in November 2016 between EMU and AP will take pedagogy out of the hands of professors and lecturers at the cost of a quality education.
“An adoption of the Academic Partnerships model of instruction would entail a significant transformation of how eastern Michigan educates students,” said Dr. Judith Kullberg, professor of political science and the president of the faculty union. “So the administration has insisted that the contract with AP is simply a marketing agreement, but we know that Academic Partnerships does way more than market.”
These allegations are based on evidence gathered through a public records request from the faculty at Eastern Michigan. They received 14,000 documents after a long process of requests, rejections, narrower requests and finally a court order.
“It’s through that process that we learned about Academic Partnerships and how they operate,” Kullberg said.
She said internal communications and documents indicated that the university had accepted more than a marketing agreement by lowering standards of admissions, particularly in regards to standardized testing. A checklist that details the terms of the contract with AP lists certain admissions criteria.
For example, the on-campus MBA program requires at least a 2.75 GPA and the GMAT, the latter of which can be waived with a 3.5 GPA and a 3.0 GPA in statistics, accounting and finance courses. The online program offered through Academic Partnerships allows the GMAT to be waived with a 2.75 GPA, according to this document.
