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

[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.