Although the outcome of the court hearing between the Faculty Association and Central Michigan University on Friday worked out well for both sides, the ugly beast of "misinformation" seems to be unescapable.

Officials from both the FA and CMU have said there are a significant number of lies being spread by their opponents.

Unfortunately, both sides are guilty of this themselves.

In the 60-page document CMU used to send FA members back to class with a preliminary injunction, they used a blatant lie on page 2.

The wording of the motion for a temporary restraining order said: "On August 22, 2011, the (CMU FA), in violation of Michigan law, went on strike against (CMU), thereby forcing CMU to cancel all of its classes."

In actuality, no classes were canceled. About 60 percent of them were not instructed, since FA members currently make up about 60 percent of CMU's total faculty, but CMU told students to go to class and never used the word canceled in emails. Meanwhile, about 439 fixed-term faculty and 591 graduate assistants still taught.

Would the truth have changed the judge's decision? Probably not. Had the irreparable harm hearing taken place as scheduled Friday, CMU would have had to explain themselves. Since the hearing was changed to a closed-door session, the inaccuracy was never mentioned.

In a rebuttal provided by Director of Public Relations Steve Smith and written by attorney Robert M. Vercruysse, representing CMU in the contract conflict, the lie continued to be defended.

"CMU advised its students to report to classes," Vercruysse said in an emailed statement. "However, if the students arrived at the classroom and the faculty member was not present at the podium to begin the class on Monday because the faculty member was on strike, then the class did not meet that day, i.e., it was canceled by the faculty member.

"CMU did not cancel classes, the faculty members who did not meet their classes canceled their classes."

Just hours after FA Presdient Laura Frey celebrated the restoration of the union's First Amendment right to picket, she tried to prohibit another First Amendment right — freedom of the press.

On Friday afternoon, Frey attempted to ban journalists from a public meeting for the second time in a week. While 15 students attended, she said she was trying to get the message out to as many students as possible.

Despite the similar incident last Wednesday and the stemming criticism in our Friday editorial, Frey failed to see the media as the best tangible way to do just that.

The FA had planned for the Michigan Education Association and eighth member of the FA bargaining team, Melvina Gillespie, to speak about the issue in public.

When journalists refused to leave Frey grudgingly spoke on behalf of Gillepsie, which is probably what they should have planned in the first place.

In today's world of citizen journalism and technology, any student there could have tweeted, texted or "facebooked" what had transpired there and it wouldn't have created as much of a stir as trying to throw journalists out of a public meeting.

Both sides clearly need work with their public relations, but is public relations really needed in this conflict? Shouldn't both sides be more focused on an agreement, or will students have to wait until the fact-finding results come through to know the real truth?