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<p>How would you know it is the complete and sole fault of IT and not the end users?? Or is this the case that it is IT’s fault even if the fault turns out to be solely isolated to the pointy-haired senior users of a given department?</p>
<p>Not that this would or should happen, but if they did let in the 76 students who saw the incorrect decisions, how would the rejected students who had not logged on in time to see the error feel? “Man, if I had only logged in an hour earlier and seen the wrong message, I could be joining those 76 kids who did.”</p>
<p>I have to agree with cobrat that this might have been an end-user error in admissions, rather than the fault of the IT group (“Problem exists between keyboard and chair”).</p>
<p>Hadn’t intended to post in the forum again, but since my view (and others’ view) that Vassar should just have admitted the students who had checked their status and seen “admitted” has been termed “ludicrous” by another poster, I decided to jump back into the fray.</p>
<p>Clearly, this is not a tragedy. Also, I doubt that there are grounds for a lawsuit, since it would be hard to argue “detrimental reliance” on the erroneous admission offer.</p>
<p>I make plenty of mistakes, myself. I wouldn’t say that Admissions is obligated to avoid mistakes, because I don’t believe that anyone can be obligated to do the impossible. </p>
<p>On the other hand, it doesn’t seem right to me to dismiss this as simply a mistake of the “get-over-it” type.</p>
<p>When there is a very uneven power relation between people, I believe that extra care is required from the party with greater power–in this case, Vassar admissions. The students have a reasonable expectation that their applications will be handled with care, including not only the reading of the applications and decision-making, but also the communication of the decisions. The more powerful party really fell down on the job in this instance.</p>
<p>Further, I agree with the point made by mini (either implicitly or explicitly, arguing from the Williams example) that there would probably be very little impact on the quality of the class as a whole if the 76 students in question were admitted. In any case, this would have been a great opportunity to run the experiment and see whether there was any detectable difference in performance.</p>
<p>The very existence of CC gives testimony to the angst that many high school seniors (and their parents) face, when dealing with college applications. It would be very desirable if the anxiety could be scaled back–and in fact, I think that it is not really warranted. Nevertheless, it would be insensitive to pretend that it doesn’t exist. The ability of some posters and their families to take “the high road” about college admissions doesn’t negate the anxiety felt by others. The college admissions people must surely know that quite a few of the students have a lot invested in the outcome emotionally, since they have applied ED.</p>
<p>Furthermore, it appears to me that some of the rejected students did not access the web site within the critical few-hour period when it was erroneous. So the 76 who did were probably those who were most eager to go to Vassar–another reason to take them, in my book.</p>
<p>Finally, with regard to Hunt’s suggestion that the college should sent each of the students $500–while I think it would be better to admit the students, I think that sending them back ten times the application fee (sort of a “punitive damages” amount) would be better than simply refunding the application fee. I am not sure that the rejected students are actually in the same state that they would have been, had they never applied. A simple refund suggests that they are.</p>
<p>CUlater21 posted while I was typing my long message (above). I have to acknowledge that some students might have been equally anxious as the 76 who logged on quickly, but they might have been tied up with EC’s or other obligations. So my suggestion is not totally fair, either–but I’m not sure that there is any totally fair outcome, given the error.</p>
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<p>rockvillemom, that’s very interesting. I wonder if he would have been nicer if the incident had become public news. Or maybe his attitude reflects that of other colleges, except that when the screwup becomes public, they’re smart enough to know they have to put a gracious face on it.</p>
<p>I didn’t read this entire thread, but:
Since this is ED, if they had admitted the 76 students, those would be 76 students unable to admitted in regular round. It’s not like this was regular admissions round, where, if they just admitted all 76 kids, chances are a bunch of the kids would have said “no” because they would be upset over the whole fiasco, and quite a few others would have been planning to choose a different school anyway, so the impact wouldn’t have been so great. But at a school with relatively small class sizes, to have 76 students in the class of 2016 who weren’t supposed to get in could prove problematic. Now 76 fewer regular admissions kids who deserve to get in don’t because “their slot” is taken.</p>
<p>Honestly, it’s not like all of these kids were emailed an admissions decision saying they had gotten in, and then rejected later. Rather, anyone who went to the website at that time saw the acceptance letter. So it was not an active mistake on the part of the admissions office.</p>
<p>As a Vassar applicant this year, I’d hate for my chances to be diminished further because 76 kids took up definite spots in the class.</p>
<p>I understand it was upsetting. As a fellow senior, I can imagine the upset and humiliation this could cause. However, within something like 45 minutes, the kids all received emails telling them what had occurred, so it’s not like they spent a very long time thinking they had gotten in.</p>
<p>Just like the majority of rest of us who either have received or will, come March, receive a rejection letter from a school we love, these kids need to accept the mistake and move on at this point. They’ll face rejection and “unfairness” throughout the rest of their lives, and months before they go off on their own to be independent members of society in college is not the time to coddle them.</p>
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<p>Many more than 76 would not be accepted RD. To compensate for the 76 admitted ED, with a yield ~ 35 percent, >200 kids would not be accepted that would have been otherwise. Just a thought.</p>
<p>On the one hand, that’s true, CrewDad. On the other hand, when Vassar admitted the >200 students RD, the school would in effect be counting on it, that only about 76 really want to come (as indicated by accepting the acceptance).</p>
<p>Right, so >200 students would be affected in a way, under this scenario, but of those, only 76 really, really wanted to come to Vassar (because they would ultimately have enrolled there). I don’t think that the students who would have been pleased to collect an acceptance, but actually prefer to go elsewhere (hence yield of 35% or so) are affected as strongly as those who applied ED.</p>
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<p>I’m confused. Isn’t that what I said? Admit > 200 (and with a ~ 35 percent yield) ~ 76 will want to come. Hence, don’t admit the 200+ and there are now 76 fewer kids accepting the offer of admission.</p>
<p>Also, the assumption is being made that 76 “extras” admitted now means that >200 would have to be rejected RD, to make the total constant.</p>
<p>But it’s not completely clear to me that the total has to be constant, actually. If this means a roughly 10% increase in the number of students in one graduating cohort, I would suspect that the extra students could be accommodated in the classes already on offer (i.e, lectures, seminars, and labs with a slight increase in the number of students in them). So the issue would primarily be one of housing (and food services). If I were the President of Vassar, I would have looked into expanded housing possibilities for a larger than normal incoming class. I don’t know much about the area where Vassar is–but could the undergrads who are further along be offered some incentive to move off campus, for example, freeing up 76 spots in the dorms? Or could some kind of arrangement be made with local apartment complexes for extra housing (as Stanford did one year, when their yield predictions were way off)?</p>
<p>At public universities, tripling does happen sometimes with freshmen (3 students in a 2-student space, with an extra bed and dresser moved in). This might not be acceptable to Vassar students, but maybe one of the ways suggested above could prevent it. (Or perhaps there could be a limit on single occupancy of 2-student spaces.)</p>
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And then the press can rake up the whole story again by interviewing all the rejected RD applicants who believe they are one of the unlucky 76/200 who would have been accepted but for Vassar’s terrible mistake. We can get all their stats too, and their stories of how much they wanted to go to Vassar, and what a tragedy it is for them. Better, I think, from Vassar’s point of view to let this die down now.</p>
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<p>There might be room in classes but not in the dorms. And what would you tell the kids who didn’t get to log in during the first 30 minutes to get erroneously rejected?</p>
<p>Right, I recognize the dorm issue, and made some suggestions, one of which worked for Stanford. But I am not familiar with the area where Vassar is. Would any of the housing suggestions in #131 be possible for Vassar?</p>
<p>@born2dance94, nice to see such maturity and level-headedness from a high school senior!</p>
<p>Just to back up my characterization of admitting all the disappointed ED applicants as “ludicrous”-- I’m sure many of us know at least one person who applied ED to a super reach school way beyond her qualifications out of self-delusion, chutzpah, parental pressure, a big application fee budget, cockeyed optimism, a what-the-hell approach, etc. (I’d put my own S in that last category), and we’ve certainly all shaken our heads over CC posters who are adamant about shooting for schools way beyond their resume because “you never know”. I think it’s fair to assume that at least one of these over-reachers was in the Vassar rejection pool. Does anyone really think that someone without the qualifications for Vassar should get a spot over a deserving RD applicant? And in that case. does the RD rejectee get an apology and an application fee refund, too, since he was equally a victim of a computer error? I’m sure in a few days when the shock has worn off, the ED rejectees will resume their normal lives and put this behind them with no lasting scars as they anticipate their next round of results.</p>
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<p>Been thinking about that. Possibly. But an unintended consequence would be parents of already enrolled students getting upset if their kid was forced into less than optimal dorm arrangements because of the overcrowding. I’d like to believe I’d rather have the 76 admitted and damn the dorm problems, but I’m paying 55k+ for a product. Severe overcrowding wasn’t in the plan.</p>
<p>Yes, the flip side of the argument in #136 is why some of the public schools can get away with having triples, because the total cost is less.</p>
<p>Not just public schools. My oldest daughter’s college, a different Seven Sister, has doubled and tripled up numerous years because of a higher than expected enrollment. My daughter was doubled up in single room her first year. Was I happy?..</p>
<p>Who is to say that the 76 students or any other student accepted during the EDII round would actually attend? None of them had even received a financial aid offer. If the money is not doable some of the ED kids will be leaving the Vassar admission on the table.</p>
<p>Mistakes happen. </p>
<p>That being said, since such a unintentionally cruel mistake happened, I think it was compounded by the business-as-usual closing of the Admissions office at 5 p.m. and the “call us Monday morning” attitude. They knew of the error, sent the first email out, then locked the office door behind them, leaving 76 distraught families to fret over this huge misstep for the entire weekend. </p>
<p>I’m not sure when the second email went out, but I think the Dean of Admissions should have been answering phone calls on Friday night, or even better, MAKING phone calls on Friday night, as soon as the mistake was discovered.</p>