Eight months ago, the New Guard exposed a Michigan State University professor’s plot to rake in roughly $60,000 per semester in extra income by forcing her students to subscribe to her personal website, “The Rebellion Community.”
Despite losing her teaching gig, making the headlines of dozens of prominent news websites, and being served a federal lawsuit, this shameless professor reportedly continues to bill her former students $99 per year.
“Just was charged $100 for the [R]ebellion, the community that Dr. Wisner was fired over,” one of her former students wrote on the MSU Reddit forum. “When I used the student discount for $30 initial purchase last year (forced), I didn’t realize it would renew the following year for the full price.”
“[The] site hasn’t even been active for months but [there are] 1100 members,” he noted in a follow-up post.
The student contacted Wisner’s website to request a refund and membership cancellation, which was reportedly denied:
“Per the terms of service, the charge is a non-refundable annual membership fee,” the professor wrote in response.
She made an offer to exchange the student’s annual membership for a monthly plan, and extended an invitation to join her “small group coaching sessions as a benefit of your membership.”
After the New Guard’s exclusive report led to her termination, Wisner (who touts socialism as her economic system of choice) seems to have shifted her full-time attention towards turning “The Rebellion Community” into a multi-level marketing scheme: Aspiring rebellion leaders can earn 50% commission on memberships they sell after making an annual investment of at least $2,000 per year.
Based on course enrollment numbers obtained by the New Guard in February, Wisner collected at least $120,000 in forced subscription fees while she was an MSU professor.
She made conflicting claims as to what she did with the funds, claiming that all funds would be donated to Planned Parenthood while simultaneously proposing that she would use the money to make a downpayment on a “rebellion RV.”
The university ultimately opted to provide students with reimbursements for their memberships out of its own wallet, while allowing Wisner to walk away with every last cent.
An ongoing lawsuit brought by two of her students alleges that Wisner violated their First Amendment rights by forcibly collecting funds for causes they vehemently oppose.
“The fact that the professor is continuing to make money off students despite no longer being employed by the university is unacceptable. Her students are still being misled and taken advantage of to this day,” Jaryn Crouson, chairwoman of Michigan State Young Americans for Freedom, told the New Guard.
Neither Wisner nor the university immediately responded to the New Guard’s request for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
