UC San Diego sends wrong e-mail to rejected students

UC San Diego Admissions Director Mae Brown said this morning that an “administrative error” was responsible for  a bogus e-mail that went out to 28,000 students congratulating them on their admission and welcoming them to the campus.

The applicants had been denied admission by the university earlier in the month. Someone accidentally sent the e-mail to the entire applicant pool of 47,000 although it was intended for only the 18,000 students who got in, Brown said.

The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Cornell University and Northwestern University’s prestigious Kellogg School of Management have experienced similar goof-ups in recent years, but the UCSD incident Monday was by far the largest.

“I take full responsibility for the error,” said Brown, who was in the office Monday until midnight preparing an apology and answering e-mails and phone calls from disappointed students and their parents. “We accessed the wrong database.

“We recognized the incredible pain receiving this false encouragement caused," she continued. "It was not our intent.”

One parent, who asked to remain anonymous because he didn’t want to intensify his daughter’s college admissions stress, called it a “colossal screw-up” and said the family had been thinking of attending “Admit Day” Saturday, as the e-mail encouraged them to do, before learning the invitation was fake.

“It was kind of a shock,”  he said.

The mistake was all the more dire because this year is shaping up as one of the toughest in recent years at San Diego and other UC campuses. In response to a UC-wide enrollment cap ordered because of the state’s budget crisis, San Diego reduced its freshman enrollment target by 520 students, to 3,775, Brown said. 

The campus, like many throughout the United States, handles most of its application process online.  Brown said the e-mail mistake would be reviewed, but she doubted the university would back off from  communications technology.

“All our research tells us students are most comfortable with online communications,” she said.

“Ouch!” said Barmak Nassirian, associate executive director of the American Assn. of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, when he heard about the failure. “I feel terrible for the applicants.”

 “This is a source of constant worry at colleges," he said. "They use extremely sophisticated systems of communication from the front end of applications all the way to alumni relations for all kinds of high-stake business, and bad things can happen all the way.”

Nassirian said, however, that the advantages of technology outweigh the risk, and he doubted colleges would go back to paper-based systems.

Brown said she and her staff would spend the day answering every phone complaint and e-mail from parents and students.

-- Gale Holland

Comments

[Daisey J. Miranda]

"Ouch", is the farthest away from what the students are probably feeling. Being a high school student that is waiting for admission letters, I think I get an idea of what this would feel like. Yes, it is understandable and perhaps forgivable but at this point there is nothing that can take away the emotional discontent that those students are going through. I know it is in the best intent of Brown to apologize for the error, but perhaps the mistakes could be avoided next time.

[tarwater]

Too many people in the United States. Too many people want to attend the University of Californi. Where is the leadership?

[Michael in Vegas]

Big mistake by UC San Diego's Admissions Office, but I wish to comment on the poor choice of words by the writer, Gale Holland. After reading Holland's story, it is evident the e-mail sent to these students was neither "bogus" nor "fake." Both of those words would imply the e-mail congratulating people on admission came from a third party with the intent to fool them into thinking they had gotten into UCSD. The fact is, it was a legitimate e-mail for the 18,000 who *were* accepted, it simply was MISTAKENLY sent to others who were *not* accepted for admission.
I am a newspaper reporter, so I know how important proper word choice is.

[Ironman Carmichael]

That kind of careless cruelty is inexcusable, and Mae Brown's half-arsed mea culpa is scant solace for those 28,000 students who must now be crushed. What a rotten joke on those poor kids. Whoever "we" are who "accessed the wrong database" should all be docked a paycheck. (And they can spare me "Oh, I guess you're perfect. I guess you never made a mistake." Not one that affected 28,000 people, I didn't.)

[Richard Ivey]

The best part about this is the phonyness of the university's hiring procedures. Had you submitted your resume for supervising the university's e-mail procedures, then you would have received a sure rejection regardless of your qualifications. Time to cut those fat budgets and reduce our taxload!!

[E L]

This isn't the first time it's happened. When I applied to UCSD in 1997 I received a rejection letter, then a few weeks later I was told it was a mistake and I got an acceptance package.

[Dwahvel]

You're comment is completely irrelevant and smacks of ignorance. Don't turn this into an immigration issue, with "too many people in the United States."

[Michael J. Arvizu]

This happened to me when I applied to the University of La Verne. Except, I was mailed a welcome package from the university's housing department congratulating me on being accepted and with information on on-campus housing.

[Not a Commie]

Need any more evidence that UC's are run by liberal incompetents who admit illegal aliens instead of residents ?

THIS JUST SUCKS. GET A CLUE UCSD!!! Same goes for all the UC's.

[Lily Sparkletoon]

They should allow the students to get in because of their error

[Nick Lewerke]

Same thing happened to me in 1997 from UCSD...I got a rejection and then an apology with an acceptence letter. Looks like technology isn't the problem...you'll always have to deal with human error.

[Todd Markey]

This same thing happened to me from the Univeristy of Rhode Island for their grad school. i got an acceptance package, sent in all the info and turned down a job offer. they called me later to ask me why i sent in all the information since i wasnt accepted. i still have the acceptance letter. The administration, and Deans didnt really seem to care.

[Sebastian]

"Administrative error" yea right. That's too flattering.

[M. Nubia-Feliciano]

As someone who works in an admissions office, this type of mistake is inexcusable, but within the realm of possibility. With budget cuts and hiring freezes, staff are asked to do the work of two and three people. This does not change during the busier times of the year - like admissions season. In order to greatly reduce the likelihood that this sort of error never happens again, the colleges and universities need to ensure that staff cuts are not the first place that they go to in order to balance their budget. I feel for the applicants and their families, but this is just a glimpse at the current state of education in California.

[rq]

Putting young people who are rejected through that ''mill"!
Someone's head needs to roll...and it should be Brown.

[Todd]

My son also received the invite e-mail but the tip off that is was probably a mistake was the fact that it was an invite letter to an orientation meeting. Yes it began with “congratulations on your admission” but that was immediately followed with “you are invited”. It was somewhat obvious that a mistake had been made since we had already received a denial e-mail several weeks earlier and the focus of this communication was an invite. Needless to say, we did not get excited and call friends and relatives. We accessed the on-line admissions site for UC San Diego and my son’s status had not changed. The denial message was still a denial message. A short time later we received the e-mail indicating a mistake had been made. I did try calling UC San Diego between their e-mails to get clarification and was not impressed with their phone/message service. I could not speak with anyone and many of their recorded messages were from early fall and December. Was it a big mistake? Yes. Did a little hope enter our emotions when we first read the e-mail? Yes. Did we get overly excited and later depressed and angry? NO.

[Hang Tran]

Overall, I'm disappointed with UCSD's Office of Admissions. When I applied to UCSD in 2003 there was a security breach on applicants' personal information (ex. SSN, family income, etc..). UCSD quickly sent out an email apologizing for its negligence. Now, the Office of Admissions is negligent again. How many more mistakes will it take the UCSD to learn?

[Teacher]

YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable for a years payment at antother school.

[Bill Justice]

This isn't exactly the biggest scandal to ever rock the state. When you consider the potential for both human and computer error, this isn't even all that shocking. It sounds like it was caught quickly, and handled in the best way possible. Are people disappointed? Absolutely... but it's melodramatic and unrealistic to think that this is going to "scar" these kids. "I turned to drugs and prostitution, all because I thought I was going to UCSD for 6 hours before I got an email saying that it was an administrative error!" Yeah, right.

Some of the comments above are just idiotic:
**"They should let them all in?" Yeah... they should let 28,000 extra under-qualified students into a school that's trying to REDUCE enrollment. Who, exactly, does that benefit?
**"Someone should be docked a paycheck." Right, because it's legal to withhold wages from an employee for making a mistake. Although I wouldn't be surprised if the person lost their job... happy?
**"I never made a mistake that affected 28,000 people." You don't KNOW 28,000 people! The university had FORTY-SEVEN THOUSAND undergraduate applicants... can you even fathom the size of that database? Do have any idea what 47,000 applications looks like? No, you don't, so lay off ... you've never made a mistake that big, because you've never had a RESPONSIBILITY that big.
**"Maybe the mistakes could be avoided next time." You can't avoid a mistake... that's why it's a mistake. I'm sure the university makes efforts to minimize mistakes, but you can't eliminate them.

All in all, I feel bad for the kids, but they'll get over it... most of them probably already have. I bet for every one call from a student that the admissions office is receiving, they're getting 100 from angry parents who are WAY more upset than their kids. These "helicopter parents" need to realize that their kids are entering adulthood, and need to be able to learn to deal with rejection without Mommy calling up Mae Brown and raising hell.

[High School Senior]

UC San Diego needs to apologize to all the students they've wronged. In fact, they should do a personal apology because I have friends who already accepted other schools because they got "rejected" from UCSD! SHAME ON UCSD! This year they really messed up.

[Kate]

"They should allow the students to get in because of their error

Posted by: Lily Sparkletoon
__

Yeah right...... they have room for less than 1/2 the number that got the letter.

So where do twice the number of professors and classrooms come from to accomodate double the number of students? Santa Claus? Going to vote to increase your taxes?

Good grief. With that kind of whiney touchy-feely nonsense, no wonder California is known as "The Cereal State - the land of fruits, nuts and flakes."

[GettMac]

Because of this colossal blunder our daughter has now been rejected by UCSD TWICE. This is just salt in the wound. Maybe she's better off not attending a university that doesn't seem to have a competent admissions department.

[Not a teacher]

"YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable for a years payment at antother school."

I'm guessing this person doesn't teach English. Or at least, I hope not.

[PDuff]

This is nothing new for the boneheads who run UCSD. I was accepted there and started attending back in 1982, but advised to pick a different college (Revelle) because my chosen one (Muir) was already full. In addition, they told me that switching colleges was merely a formality.

Well, it was a lot more than a formality. In order to get the transfer approved in my sophomore year after they told me my reasons weren't 'compelling' enough, we submitted the original letter as proof (thank God my mother was so organized), threatened to expose the lies they were telling potential students to the local newspaper and even, if necessary, complain to our elected politicians at the state and national level. The transfer was granted.

After that experience, I made it my mission to embarrass the administration with regular articles in the campus humor newspaper, The Koala (and of course both lawsuits and removal of funding were threatened). But I held firm, and in 1986 I graduated from Muir College with a degree in Economics.

Too bad they're still messing up, because academically it's still a great school!

[anon]

I think everyone needs to maintain a little perspective. Yes, college admissions are stressful, and I can only imagine how difficult admission must be this year. With a bloated applicant pool, fewer spots, and genuine money concerns, competition to attend an affordable UC school must be very high.

With that said, these students were already rejected. Sure, there must have been some momentary hope, but at the very least it should have been mitigated with genuine confusion, and probably suspicion. The calls for action posted here are reactionary, and extremely short-sighted.

Let everyone into UCSD? Are you crazy? Not only will this result in completely, and probably irreparably, sinking the admissions standards of one of the best public schools in the country, it's simply impossible. There's not enough space.

Look, I can see why people are frustrated, and the administration owes an apology email (if they haven't already). But this isn't going to ruin anyone's life. These kids were already rejected. Much of this sounds like misplaced blame for a frustrating and difficult admissions season.

Good luck to parents and high school seniors.

[A UCSD Student]

The UCSD Office of Admissions is dealing with this situation the best it can, and I admire Mae Brown for stepping up and taking responsibility for this mistake. I understand that it's easy to make a mistake like this with the technologies set in place today. There are bound to be accidental clicks and whatnot.

There are already safeguards in place in the UCSD email system, i.e. having the emails approved by an administrator before sending it out. If Admissions sets up this system, perhaps this major blunder will not happen again.

[Happy Harry]

YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable for a years payment at antother school.

Posted by: Teacher | March 31, 2009 at 04:28 PM
-------------------

While I somewhat understand the outrage, a number of aspects of this post reflect very poorly--much more so than UCSD's administative mistake--on your own ability to be teaching kids. Those who live in glass houses...

[M. C.]

I agree that this is a very unfortunate incident for many students out there. However, letting everyone into the school would not be the answer. It is hard enough for a University to compensate for all the needs of already enrolled students. And apparently the people receiving the email had already been rejected and just happened to receive the invitation letter. At least there are other options for undergraduate education and with it becoming more difficult each year to get into college I am sure the students are not THAT heart broken.

[English teacher]

I am compelled to comment on the posting by "teacher" whose comment was riddled with grammatical errors. I hope you're not teaching writing or grammar classes!! The teacher's suggestion, that the school would be "responceable for a years payment at antother school" is ludicrous--it was an administrative error and does not need to be corrected with money. It's not as if the students lost any money through this erroneous email.

[Carla]

To all the people with the pitchforks, get over your entitlement mentality. Just because you get your feelings hurt does not mean you get a big free prize. Stop ruining this country by suing for every grievace like a whiny child and have some dignity.

[Juaquin]

Sure it kinda sucks, but anyone with half a brain (which should be most of the students applying to UCSD) should have known that they wouldn't be denied admission and then suddenly "admitted" a couple weeks later. If they somehow HAD changed their mind, I'm sure an email would be sent out saying something to the order of "disregard the last email, we have actually decided to admit you after all".

Clerical error that was uncool? Yes.
End of the world: No.

[Michelle S]

I agree with M. Nubia-Feliciano's comment on office staff's workload being a combination of two and three people. I can feel it at the firm I work that does state work. I'm doing more than I should and human error happens. I think those seniors can handle it. You can't just get overtly excited over an invitation, which was not an acceptance letter.

One more thing that really got me "lol" was a comment made by Teacher. I hope LAUSD sent you a pink slip. You really need to go back to remedial English class because "YOUR A SCHOOL" is either an intended grammatically errored comment or a highly unlikely another human error made on your part. You call yourself a teacher. tsk tsk

[Mike]

It's UCSD, I would be more concerned if I got in...

[Ms. Perfect]

People are still allowed to make mistakes, right?

What was the price of the mistake, hurt feelings?

And if they allow all the kids in because of the error, then I will feel sorry for all the kids who actually earned their admission.

[USC Trojan]

"YOUR A SCHOOL!"

Reallly? Really?

Please tell me you're not an actual teacher....

[Haha]

"YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable for a years payment at antother school." - Teacher

That comment is absolutely hilarious. I'm sorry, to call yourself teacher, criticize the school for their mistakes and "how they are teaching the kids" and to eff up this monumentally is absolutely extraordinary. Thanks for making my day.

Ps, just to clarify its "you're", "responsible", and "another".

[Dave]

YOUR [sic] A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable [sic] for a years payment at antother [sic] school.

Posted by: Teacher | March 31, 2009 at 04:28 PM

Wow. Three typos in as many lines, and the "Teacher" wants to talk about assigning responsibility for errors. Let me guess: you teach at a public school, don't you?

[John]

Mistakes Happen. End of Story.

[Paul]

You're (not Your) a teacher responsible (not responceble) for educating our children? We've apparently got bigger problems with our education system than an email list error.

[UCSD??]

I found out a few weeks ago that I was accepted to UCSD, I even got a letter in the mail. Does this still affect me or was just the email a mistake??

[dj]

FYI, the 'rejected' students who received these bogus emails already knew that they were rejected. Furthermore, they most likely would have double-checked their admission by actually logging into the UCSD application site, and see that they are still rejected. Anybody in their right mind will realize right off-the-bat that it is a mistake email, that it was sent to all applicants or error.

The angry parents who are speaking out, are just bitter and PO'ed that their S or D could not make it into SD.

I understand that this is a huge blow to the already dejected students, but once again, it goes to show that we are only human.

And also, UCSD DID send an apology email, and it was 2 hours after they sent the bogus. 2 HOURS

[sara]

Anyone else think it's hilarious that someone with the username "Teacher" posts:

YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable for a years payment at antother school.

I really hope he or she is not a teacher. At least not for English.

I can only see making some sort of reparations if any student declined any offers or made a housing payment or something like that, with proof.

[Anonymous]

All of you bitter parents and students with INADEQUATE sons and daughters, PLEASE STOP YOUR WHINING. It's not the end of the world. Sure, it was a big "screw up" but projecting your anger on to UCSD, a common psychological self defense mechanism, only makes you and your children look more uneducated. Thank you.

-Student

[Gary]

"UC San Diego needs to apologize to all the students they've wronged. In fact, they should do a personal apology because I have friends who already accepted other schools because they got "rejected" from UCSD! SHAME ON UCSD! This year they really messed up. "

But they ARE rejected. So what's the problem?

These things happen. And when technology is involved, they happen on a much larger scale.

[Max Mata]

While everyone is focusing on their mistake of sending wrong email to 28000 kids, we should acknowledge and give them credit for sending right email to 18000 kids. So they hit 40% passmarks. Wait a minute: did they intend to invite those admitted?

[Eddie]

"Looks like technology isn't the problem...you'll always have to deal with human error." Nick Lewerke

Human error?? Aren't computers programmed by humans, isn't technology created by humans??

Yes it's human error...from here to the stars!!

[Matthew]

"Teacher" commented, March 31 at 4:28pm: "YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen." You're (supposedly) a teacher. You used the word "your." Presumably, you meant "you're." This should not happen. The numerous spelling errors in the rest of the comment also should not happen. I must admit, I would much rather attend a school that makes an email notification mistake than one that employs teachers who don't know how to spell and use correct grammar.

[Current UCSD student]

Many of the "qualified" students who actually got into UCSD can't cut it here. Why would anyone suggest that an extra 28,000 "unqualified" students should get in because of an e-mail? Because of emotional distress? Grow up. They already got a rejection letter in the mail. Did that emotionally scar them too?

There are already too many underclassmen. I have priority registration and still got waitlisted for a class. I'm sure a lot of these whining parents would be very unhappy with the quality of education this university has to offer. Do everyone a favor and send your kids to a college that doesn't make these kinds of mistakes. O and keep babying your soon-to-be high school graduates- they'll make fantastic adults!

[berkeley2013]

This happened to a friend of mine, who never checked the initial online decision. She was so excited at school today, and she went around telling everyone about how excied she was (it was her top choice). I feel terrible, because she went to sleep before the correction e-mail was sent out, and I had a hunch that the e-mail was a mistake, because I heard other rejectees talking about how they received the same letter, and without being sure it was an accident, I didn't want to ruin her day.

It's just so awful because she was so happy, and called all of her relatives, and told everyone at school, and it was all a mistake.

That said, errors happen. It was an invite e-mail, not an official letter of acceptance. Most people knew something might be off, were cautious, and did not get outrageously excited over an invite to admit day. I'm sure the entire staff feels terrible about what happened, and I don't think any of this warrants someone's job to be lost, or pay to be docked. They responded within a timely manner, and are doing all they can to set things straight. What more do you want?

[trandom]

re: "YOUR A SCHOOL ! This should not happen. If this happens now just think how they are teaching the kids.
The school should be responceable for a years payment at antother school."

Posted by: Teacher"

note to teacher (for irony's sake): it's YOU'RE, not YOUR. and don't get me started on "responceable" and "antother." i hope you don't teach anymore.

[sue]

This was obviously a horrible unintentionable techinical error. More and more businesses, including colleges, rely on technology to do our communicating...With that said it is inevitable...there will be computer glitches that is out of human control AND there will be human error due to all of the technicalities involved in technological communication -Even a slight interruption(phone call or in-office visitor) to the person or persons responsible for these processes could cause such an error. So many people (outside the realm of IT especially) expect perfection with these processes when in fact it is a very sophisticated, time consuming, tedious procedure. Most times this process will require the persons involved to gather this population of folks(in this instance, admission denials) making sure you have selected the right individuals you randomly 'test' to ensure your query has indeed the folks you want (admission denials)..once this query has been established you would need to save it as your new query database and then set up your e-mail content accordingly...then do a mail merge of sorts, e-mail merge....this is where it is extremely easy to have an error happen...if someone were to walk in your office or a phone call were to happen... the wrong query database of folks could be selected....very, very easilly done...especially when working in a fast-paced, time -sensitive environment. I believe these individuals, most of the time behind the scenes, are underpaid and overworked.....And perhaps need to be 'protected' a little more ...meaning have it a rule to not have any interruptions to these folks unless it is via e-mail, to which they could respond as they could.

[Jane Doe]

I am a student at the university of california. Although the UCSD's administration made a slight error, this should not be reflected badly upon the school. UCSD's science department is one of the best in the country. Along with the beach being a five minute walk, UCSD's laid back atomosphere makes it an excellent school to attend. I'm sorry that students were upset for about half an hour about when they were confused about being accepted or not, but they should not take their anger out on the school. If UCSD was really their first choice, they could always try transferring in the next year.

[kickerofelves]

How mediocre a student are you if getting into UCSD makes your day? The only thing more pathetic would be getting rejected by them.

[JMM]

It was a mistake - and all had previously received notification that they could not be admitted. The only thing that should have been questioned was the conflicting information.

Comparing and contrasting is a basic skill - tested on every SAT/ACT exam given. If these students could not compare/contrast and realize something was amiss, then their prognosis for success in college is already significantly reduced.

Two hours after the first email was mis-sent, a correction was issued. To think that the anonymous parent quoted above was planning to attend admit day suggests some pretty quick planning. Two hours isn't a lot of time to plan a trip to San Diego, then be so harmed when the mistake is realized.

[Down with Mae Brown]

UC San Diego Admissions Director Mae Brown should resign or she should be fired. She assumed total responsibility for the blunder so let her take the fall. Of course, maybe, these days you can do anything you want as long as you say "I'm sorry".

[College Student]

This was a horrible mistake and I feel for all those who recieved the e-mail by accident, but people should stop suggesting foolish ideas because it does not help the matter. No, UCSD should not admit everyone (they were originally rejected for a reason, the school does not have the resources to have that number of students, the budget could never accomidate them). No, UCSD shouldn't pay for the rejected students tuition at another school (just a ridiculous suggestion). An apology has been issued to each student and there will undoubtedly be severe consequences for the staff members that played a role in this, but other than that, there is no need to ask outlandish requests and drag out this mistake. This was an unfortunate event that does not at all reflect the academic standards of the university (as it is one of the TOP public universities in the country in all areas of study, especially science and engineering) and houses some of the greatest minds of the world (2008 Nobel Prize Chemist Roger Tsien). Again this was of course a sad technical mistake on the part of the admissions staff, but to further drag out this mistake would only add insult to injury.

[Some perspective...]

As a high school teacher with students affected by this, I can tell you that the students are clearly dealing with this better than those commenting here. For those who think the applicants should have known better than to believe the email or shouldn't let it affect them emotionally, these are 17 year olds! EVERYTHING takes them on an emotional roller coaster! Imagine if an accidental email went out canceling prom? It would put UCSD to shame.

[robin forbes]

so was the email sent to 28,000 or 47,000?

[It is just a college]

I am the parent of a high school senior, and she is trying to decide between colleges. This weekend she is looking at UC San Diego. I am letting her do the choosing, but to be honest I am disappointed in the direction Californians have taken our public universities. They were designed to provide a good, broad-based education to the sons and daughters of Californians...and we have paid taxes all of our lives to support this concept. The UC's in particular have suffered from California budget priorities that put education low on the list. Valuable programs, particularly in the arts and humanities, have taken a back seat to subjects that are supported by industry - engineering and product-driven biological research. We encourage students who are all about competition, and who gave away their youth in order to 'kill and drill' for exams. We love new California residents who come here specifically to claim their spot by having focused on tests and grades, not life. So even though my daughters 'qualify' to attend our public UC's, I am disappointed at what they have become because I suspect that our public colleges are shaping students to become simple capitalists rather than good, engaged citizens.

[And another thing]

I take the blame for the email...and for the overworked staff of all of our public schools In fact, I also put the blame for this incident squarely on the shoulders of the guilty parties - the voters of California. I am a sixth generation Californian and lifelong, tax-paying, voting resident of this great state. We, the voters, have continued to gut the budgets of our public schools because of our own greed and unwillingness to pay our taxes. We pay fewer dollars per student than most other states, by far. Our teachers and administrators are paid pitifully, then we blame them for not jumping through new hoops. Our economy is cutting education even further. Having visited many schools with my high school senior daughter this year, I see over and over that the admissions offices of our colleges are clearly under-staffed and over-worked. And I know quite well where the blame lies - with the cheap and selfish me-first fellow voters of my state.

[Just Chill Already]

in reference to "Down with Mae Brown"

You're an idiot.

There is no perfect fix to a problem like this one. I can't imagine why you think firing the person who MANAGES the person(s) who actually did it would be a reasonable solution, especially considering she wasn't even physically present when they did it.

YES, let's get rid of someone who has been doing her job right for who knows how long to appease a bunch of whiny HS Seniors and people across the country who have nothing to do with it but just so happened to catch it on CNN or in the LA-times. Yeah cuz that'll help the admissions department endlessly!

I remember more than anyone what it feels like to be rejected from your dream school. It sucks, but guess what, you move on. Just get over it already!

[Ben Weaver]

May 1, 2009, New UCSD Admissions Bloopers; First it was the erroneous acceptance letters to thousands of rejected students, now the trauma has been passed on to accepted students that have recently been sent erroneous denial letters. Such accidents are unacceptable for both the harm they do to students, the university and the tax payer.