Feb 25, 2011

Oops We Did It Again—CNU Forced to Rescind 2000 Offers


It’s just way too easy to mistakenly push the “send” button on both ends of the college admissions process. Anxious applicants do it, and now college admissions offices are doing it as well.

With increasing frequency, it seems some poor administrator makes an unfortunate slip and sends off offers of admission to a few thousand high school students and then is forced to admit it was all a huge mistake.

It’s happened to Cornell, North Carolina, NYU, and the University of California San Diego. In fact, it happened a year ago when George Washington University mistakenly sent an email letter of acceptance to 2000 Early Decision II applicants—after they had already received a letter of rejection.

Now it’s Christopher Newport’s turn to send apologies after emailing 2000 students welcoming them to the Class of 2015, only to be forced to withdraw the offers four hours later.

“We understand that for some students this is a highly emotional time and we would like to express our regret for any additional anxiety this may have caused,” wrote Maury O’Connell, CNU vice president for student services in an email to all accepted then rejected students. The mistake was “solely a result of human error.”

The crack investigative reporters over at The Chronicle of Higher Education checked with “Captain Chris,” the admissions office’s resident answer-bot for an explanation:

Q. Why did you extend and then rescind an offer of admission to 2,000 prospective students?
A. Admissions decisions are mailed on a rolling basis.
Q. Will heads roll over this mistake?
A. We’re sorry we could not find an answer to your question.

Gotta love it.

The real decisions will be emailed by March 15. In the meantime, anyone with questions about an application status can call 757-594-7015 or email admit@cnu.edu.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.


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