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The Purdue University Global confirmed Tuesday that it had eliminated forced arbitration agreements for students. Purdue’s controversial plan to ban class-action lawsuits and push arbitration, even in fraud cases brought by students, came to light in August. The next month, the university said it would scrap a similarly controversial requirement that faculty members sign confidentiality agreements with implications for ownership of their own course materials and for hiring former colleagues and speaking about Purdue upon departure from the institution. But the fate of the student arbitration agreements remained less clear.
Indiana chapters of the American Association of University Professors, which advocated against forced arbitration, claimed victory in a statement this week. The AAUP also has asked Purdue faculty bodies help make students aware of the change. A Purdue spokesperson said that Purdue Global’s governing board changed its forced arbitration policy last semester in response to a federal court ruling on arbitration and subsequent regulatory guidance, not AAUP action. Purdue Global purchased Kaplan University in 2017. Purdue has attributed both contentious faculty and student policies to Kaplan.
