Litigation

In November 2007, Third Education Group, Inc., brought a lawsuit against Richard Phelps, a former participant in the organization. To view the complaint submitted to the Wisconsin district court, click here. This complaint lays out the history of the dispute with Phelps, as well as a more general history of this organization.

As the complaint notes, the dispute largely originated because of disagreement over an article published by the journal and recommended for publication by two of the three reviewers. (Phelps was the third.) When the article was published, Phelps changed the password to Third Education Group's website and subsequently moved the domain to his own web site. Since then, he has mounted a steady campaign against Third Education Group, Inc., and its journal--claiming ownership of its title, of its ISSN number, and of the domains originally used by the journal.

In September 2007, Phelps' attorney sent a letter to our service provider under the federal Digital Millenium Copyright Act, followed by a more detailed second letter, demanding that our site be taken down because of alleged copyright violations. As a result, the site was blocked until early December. Following a "counter notification" from our attorney, it was available once but then taken down again by our service provider, Pair Networks. Since then, we have changed providers.

Phelps' attorneys have since counter-sued in federal court. One disturbing element of Phelps' attorney's filings is the number of half-truths and deliberate falsehoods included in an attempt to rewrite the history of the Third Education Group to make the argument that Phelps was the sole participant. This willingness to alter the facts to fit a desired conclusion was one factor in our decision to remove Phelps' article from our journal. In the article, Phelps argued that the problems with test score inflation some years back no longer exist with the growth of high-stakes testing. Did Phelps ignore or suppress evidence to the contrary? We do not know, but in light of his willingness to alter the facts about TEG, we think it is possible.

Since Phelps closed the journal's site, we have worked diligently for a solution that would avoid litigation while upholding the editorial integrity of this journal. Several others, believing in the journal's mission, have tried to negotiate a solution, only to eventually give up in frustration as Phelps kept changing his demands. We have started litigation reluctantly but intend to see it through to a successful conclusion.