We, as concerned current and former members of the Honors Community, are writing today to express our dissatisfaction with the recent and ongoing injustices that have been perpetuated by the Honors Director at Central Michigan University. We are demanding that a more transparent approach be taken among the leadership within the Honors Program. Additionally, we are calling for an increase in accountability among the current Honors Director.

We have assembled a list of grievances and demands to be addressed by the Central Michigan University administration. The following list represents our current grievances based on the current information available to us: 

We feel that the reorganization initiatives undertaken by the new Honors Director have been conducted in such a way that is harmful to students, alumni, and the program. In reorganization, Judy Idema's position was eliminated from the Honors Program. This was done with absolutely no communication to the students regarding the actions that had been taken or why, and instead was discovered through word of mouth and confirmed by her removal from related websites and groups. Judy was a vital mentor and many students depended on her for advice and support. Abruptly, they have now rescinded this advice and support with no rationale. In addition, she led significant programs and events for the Honors Program including HON 100, The Honors Teaching Assistant Class, Beaver Island Classes, Academic Advising, The Centralis Scholarship Competition, the Honors Welcome, Honors Graduation, and other honors events including student group advisement. Furthermore, the administration has provided seemingly no sufficient alternative for students seeking the areas of expertise that Judy provided throughout her 21 years of employment at this institution. 

Additionally, we take issue with the seeming disregard for the will of the Honors Council, the Academic Senate appointed body of faculty, staff, and students who are charged with overseeing the Honors Program. Dr. Barco has cancelled five of seven Honors Council meetings this year which has limited the ability for students to weigh in on concerns they have regarding policies and procedures. 

The overwhelming lack of communication and respect from Dr. Nicole Sparling-Barco, the current director of the Central Michigan University Honors Program has left members of her program feeling insignificant, lost, and disregarded. These feelings have come about upon Dr. Barco’s constant failure to arrive to meetings in a timely manner, if at all, constant failure to respond to student communication (sometimes weeks or months later), if at all, and constant failure to uphold the four Core Values of the Honors Program. Additionally, Dr. Barco has provided no regular means of communication which has directly impacted things like course registration, academic advising, capstone advising, graduation questions, scholarship questions, and student mental health. This lack of communication has caused great anxiety and growing frustration among the Honors Community. 

We are also concerned by Dr. Barco’s pausing of Facebook groups for Honors 100 Teaching Assistants and Honors alumni after the news of Judy Idema’s firing was circulated, to stop people from posting, seemingly to stop discussion of the matter.

It is of great concern to us that both student employees and all secretary staff members of the Honors Office, who were service excellence award winners, were led to quit. We are alarmed by this rapid turnover of staff.

There have been at least four known violations of changes in requirements to the Honors Program admission criteria done without approval from the Honors Council and Academic Senate which change the standards for the process by which students are admitted to the program that could potentially compromise the integrity of the program. As follows, Dr. Barco has, without approval:
Reduced Honors Track II admission criteria from a 3.5 cumulative GPA to a 3.25 cumulative GPA.
Created Honors Open Admission for any student interested in applying for a seat in the Honors Program, which removes the requirement for an ACT or SAT score as well as the  GPA requirement.
Dropped the SAT or ACT score requirement from the Centralis Application criteria.
Approved diversity course Honors requirements outside of the usual list of acceptable courses for individuals.

Finally, since all of this information was released, there has once again been extremely poor and inappropriate communication from the Honors Program about the leave of absence of Dr. Barco. The students of class HON320, which Dr. Barco leads, were the first to find out and only found out an hour and a half before class began. There has been no official communication about this leave of absence and the only way to find out has once again been word of mouth.

 

Given the extent of the grievances presented in this letter, we are requesting the following changes to be made by the administration at Central Michigan University: 

A formal review of the process by which the Honors Director and core staff are hired to ensure that the students involved in the Honors Director Search Committee are given a greater role in the hiring process. 

That any decisions involving the reorganization of core Honors Program staff be relayed, in a timely manner, to staff and students with full transparency and clear and detailed reasoning.

That Dr. Barco immediately steps down as the director of the Honors Program, given her blatant disregard for the opinions of students and a failure to protect the interest of Honors students, alumni, faculty, staff, and the program as a whole. 

That an interim director be placed in charge of the program. This individual should have prior leadership experience within the Honors Program, be student centered, and demonstrate the values of our  community. 

The creation of an anonymous system by which students, particularly Honors Department student workers, can report misconduct by Honors staff or potential Honors staff without the fear of academic retaliation or the threatening of financial status. We believe that this is vital given the current situation. 

A written, formalized guarantee that students who publicly come out against the current Honors Program Director with complaints will not have their academic standing, campus jobs, or scholarship threatened.

A written administrative review of how well Dr. Barco, the current Honors Director has followed the scholarship policies detailed in accordance with contractual obligations made to the students. 

A formal review from the Academic Senate take place as to why the Honors Council was cancelled five of seven times in the past year at the request of Dr. Barco.

All social media groups paused or achieved by Dr. Barco be immediately reopened.  

Honors students are expected to represent the epitome of excellence and to set a model example for other students on campus. We are deeply disheartened that the Honors Director does not seem to apply these same standards to herself; particularly when she is demanding it of the students. 

As current members and alumni, we are extremely invested in the well being of the Honors Program at Central Michigan University. It is the reason that we find ourselves writing this letter today. While we acknowledge that we do yet have all the information, current evidence regarding the situation makes it clear that unethical and inappropriate actions have occurred. We feel that the demands outlined in this letter are vital to the success of the Honors Program and overall is in the best interest of the students. 

 

Anonymous Student Testimonials

With word getting around the university about the situation with Dr. Barco as Honors Director, more and more students reached out to us with personal testimonials about experiences they had with her as director, and as a professor both before she became director and afterwards.

We feel these are important to include as they represent not only specific instances of injustices but evidence that suggests students feelings and opinions of Dr. Barco before her hiring were completely ignored. We also suggest further reading of Dr. Barco’s reviews on Rate My Professors, which while we recognize are frequently on the furthest ends of the spectrum, are supported by stories here.

If you would like to add to these testimonials, please feel free to email nigexic394@quossum.com and we will add it as an update to the petition. All emails will stay anonymous.

“I had Barco for eng 333a spring semester last year, when the pandemic hit. I dropped the class right at that point because of her disrespectful attitude towards students. Dr. Barco firstly did not teach. Us as students did presentations every class period that were intended to teach the class. We did not even get background info on the books we were reading. She did a syllabus day on the first day of class and that is the last time she actually taught us. Secondly, she came into class sick in the beginning of March 2020 and proceeded to cough all over us and then say “do not come to class sick.” Lastly and I feel this is the most important for your grievances, she came into class and yelled at us because she thought we weren’t reading the book. She interrogated us all class and made several people drop the class right then. My personal feelings are that she is a person who will only ever look out for herself. She doesn’t care about students and never will.”

“I had Dr. Barco Spring 2020 for ENG 333. Initially, she presented herself as someone who was an advocate for students. That was obviously not the case. The first day of class, she lashed out at a student for asking a question about what we were doing in class. As the semester went on she started to show us that she could care less about us academically and mentally. She would show up 15 min late for class. She would not explain any assignments beyond what was on the syllabus. Her attitude towards us became extremely unprofessional. When approached in email about an assignment, she lashed out at me about what I was asking her about. She did not teach the course. Students taught themselves through the books that were being read and assignments that were being done. We had a final exam that took me 3 days to complete. It was a written exam per the pandemic that was taking place. It was 10 pages long for 5 questions. It was full of quotes and I worked extremely hard on it. I got a 60% on the assignment. I was extremely upset because I thought that my hard work had paid off. When I approached Dr. Barco she told me that it was not what was required. All of my friends in the class got a A-B or higher. I was extremely disappointed. She was not willing to change the grade for the final. Dr. Barco drug me through the mud because she did not appreciate me questioning her assignments. Another example of her behavior. We walked into class one day with the desks turned into a Socratic seminar. We were to share a quote out of the book we were reading and why that quote stood out to us. When it was my turn, I told her that I didn’t read the book because it made no sense to me. I didn’t understand the text. I told her that other students were struggling with the text too. She did not appreciate my comment and used it as an opportunity to attack us as a class. Her words were “ this is why we are doing this to see if anybody is reading in my class “. Dr. Barco does not deserve to be a professor at CMU. She deserves to be removed from CMU faculty because she is incompetent at being a professor. She does not know how to teach or do what is in the best interest of students. In addition, 333 is a class about Hispanic English authors basically. She taught Hamilton because she loved the play. Not because it was a benefit for us but because it benefitted her.”

“I had to meet with Dr. Barco to discuss the honors protocol and my scholarship. She was late to the meeting, implied that previous agreements would not be honored, and told me to email her after the meeting and she would review what we'd discussed and follow up when she had an answer. After over a week with no response, I emailed again asking if she'd found out anything else. She answered me as if we'd never met, and she knew nothing of my situation, so I was questioning whether she'd planned to follow up at all. I had to send yet another email detailing what we'd discussed in our meeting, and after nearly two weeks, she finally responded. This situation lasted much longer than it should have. My scholarship pays my rent and buys my groceries, and she seemed to have no regard for the stress that this put me under.”