Carnegie-Mellon Sends Hundreds of Acceptance Letters By Mistake 131
An anonymous reader writes As reported in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Carnegie-Mellon University mistakenly sent 800 acceptances for its Master of Science in Computer Science program. They're not saying "computer error," but what are the other explanations? High irony all around. The program accepts fewer than nine percent of more than 1,200 applicants, which places the acceptance level at about a hundred, so they're bad at math, too.
You.. You.. MELON FARMER! (Score:1)
censored version of die hard on TV
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Melon Carnage
That would be Gallagher with his sledge-o-matic.
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Yippie Ki-Yay, Mr. Falcon. [youtube.com]
Re: What should they do? (Score:5, Funny)
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They haven't been to school yet. The best lawyers they can get are probably just what you can find using Google.
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Depends on how good lawyers they have
This. There is also an element of randomness, but the quality of the lawyers matters a lot.
If there was no language or contract saying otherwise, then the school's offer created a power of acceptance among the students at the least, and anyone who told the school they would go in that time now has a contract with the school.
If there were early decision applicants, then the school's acceptance likewise created the contract.
Finally, if there were students who materially changed their position in reasonable r
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These days, if a person makes an error, they are held to it forever, but a corporation makes an error, and they make a non-apology and fight any consequences
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Re:What should they do? (Score:5, Funny)
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If you want to make 80K a year in CS or IT in general, you don't have to graduate from C-M to do it.
If you want to work at Google or someplace like that, it may be somewhat more helpful.
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Nope. Google does not care about the useless "where you went to school" nonsense.
They want to know you have skills and abilities. Show up with a brilliant invention under your arm and they will gladly take an ITT Tech graduate.
Yes where your degree is from matters (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope. Google does not care about the useless "where you went to school" nonsense.
I don't believe that for a second. It might not be of primary concern but I have zero doubt that if you went to MIT or Carnegie Mellon and graduated with an IT related degree, it WILL factor into the hiring decision at Google.
They want to know you have skills and abilities.
Of course they do. That's precisely why they care whether or not you graduated from a known good training program. It is evidence that you are likely to have the sort of skills they are looking for. They'll test you further but it is a piece of evidence.
Show up with a brilliant invention under your arm and they will gladly take an ITT Tech graduate.
Perhaps but since that doesn't happen very often where you went to school WILL get looked at.
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After a job or three, basically nobody that knows shit cares were you went to school or even if you went to school.
I've known useless air thieves with degrees from Berkeley and MIT. Smart but useless.
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After a job or three, basically nobody that knows shit cares were you went to school or even if you went to school.
Which suggests that for your first job or three, the people hiring you will, indeed, care where you got your degree.
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Some more then others.
They will also care what you got your degree in.
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After a job or three, basically nobody that knows shit cares were you went to school or even if you went to school.
So you are saying where you went to school is very important, since it has an impact on your early career. How you spend the first 5-10 years of your career has enormous impact on your entire career. There are obviously exceptions, but by definition most people are not exceptions.
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"I don't believe that for a second."
I do some Google work. I've got just a high-school diploma and a teensy bit of college under my belt.
I had to go through three face-to-face vetting interviews.
Sadly my section is getting shut down roughly mid-year this year, so unless I get moved elsewhere, I'm going to be back to designing lighting and hydro systems.
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I do some Google work. I've got just a high-school diploma and a teensy bit of college under my belt.
That is not evidence that they don't consider your educational background in the hiring decision. It might not be a requirement but it sure as hell doesn't hurt to have a degree from a good school.
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So what? It does not hurt anywhere to have a degree from a good school. But he already proved that a cool degree from MIT or Carnegie-Mellon is not a strict requirement at Google.
Who cares if he proved that? It is irrelevant to the conversation. The only question is whether or not the degree is a factor in hiring. The original post by "sjbe" already conceded it might not be of primary concern.
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And yet most of them can't say they were face-to-face vetted by Google staff in interviews.
There's the difference.
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Apparently you can't follow the conversation.
Try reading at my first post and working your way down the thread, instead of assuming you know full-well what is being discussed. It's obvious you missed some critical stuff.
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Just like showing up with a fancy invention will get you serious consideration, showing up with a degree from the consistently #1 rated computer science program in the country (and possibly the world) would get you noticed, and likely hired.
It's like saying you don't need to be 7 foot tall to play basketball. But if you were 7 foot tall, and showed up to tryouts, do you think they might be more likely to give you serious consideration?
Re:Yes where your degree is from matters (Score:5, Insightful)
if you went to MIT or Carnegie Mellon and graduated with an IT related degree, it WILL factor into the hiring decision at Google.
It will factor even more into the decision to interview you in the first place. At my company, we interview only about 5% of applicants. Google likely interviews a much smaller percentage.
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I don't believe that for a second. It might not be of primary concern but I have zero doubt that if you went to MIT or Carnegie Mellon and graduated with an IT related degree, it WILL factor into the hiring decision at Google.
Sure, it absolutely factors into a hiring decision. Your degree is important for getting in the door initially without any initial experience, of course, or perhaps for standing out among equally qualified candidates. However, if you have a few years of experience, people generally stop caring about where you went to school or (occasionally) even if you went to school at all, because at that point your work record should speak for itself.
Whenever I was asked to evaluate candidates, my criteria in order of
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Let's be clear. I didn't say Google itself cared. I said it might be somewhat more useful to go to C-M if you wanted to work at Google. That's different.
Google has a Pittsburgh office whose opening was motivated, in part, due to close ties with C-M. Also due to the high quality of IT candidates in that area, which is also a side effect of C-M.
They may not have a requirement that you have that name on your diploma, but there is close proximity to that Google office, and C-M has very good outreach and an
Re:What should they do? (Score:4, Informative)
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Why the hell should they offer anything? It was a mistake, tough luck. Why does the topic of compensation come up for every simple mistake these days?
So what if you were disappointed - welcome to the real world, sometimes your hopes are dashed after being raised.
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Re:What should they do? (Score:4, Insightful)
Depends on the actual harm. I doubt your story of how you told the 7-11 to go fuck themselves once you got into C-M is going to get much sympathy in court. That just sounds like you burned bridges unnecessarily. Besides, there are tons of shit jobs out there, as long as you don't want to make a career out of them.
As the article said, however, if you were accepted elsewhere prestigious and declined their offer, and now you had no place to go in the fall, that's something that represents real harm. In that case, you have to accept either waiting a semester or a whole year to reapply to the other school, or you have to accept going to a less prestigious school, which would have longer term effects.
You could then additionally argue (without mentioning any burned bridges) that a year of waiting to try again (and possibly failing the second time around) would represent a hardship financially as well, but that is less persuasive because going to grad school costs money, it doesn't make you money. You could get TA jobs and grad living arrangements, of course, but it's not like being a grad student is actually more lucrative in the short term than being a pizza delivery person who lives with their parents for another year.
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... but it's not like being a grad student is actually more lucrative in the short term than being a pizza delivery person who lives with their parents for another year.
Maybe the parents should be the ones suing.
Re:What should they do? (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem with the burned bridges "tough luck" is that, as you say, you may have declined another grad school opportunity. In that case, I think CMU has responsibility for the situation and should work with the other school to make sure the applicant gets in somewhere.
Being a grad student isn't more lucrative than pizza delivery, on the whole, However, it advances one's career much more, and so having to wait another year is simply cutting a year out of the applicant's professional life.
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There's an easy solution: Let them all in and flunk 90%. Added benefit: You retain only those who can handle the heat.
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When I was in college, I was only on partial scholarships and (this was before the days of online payments; the bursar figured out payments by hand in front of me) so I had to go to the bursar's office, check in hand, and pay my tuition once a month per my contract.
Well, the bursar got the number wrong one month. I owed a couple hundred more dollars more, plus what I hadn't paid the previous month. I, being about 19, pouted, whined and expressed my quiet outrage to the person taking my check. After all,
Dammit Jim! (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm a PhD in CompSci, not a software engineer!
Re:Dammit Jim! (Score:5, Funny)
I'm a PhD in CompSci, not a software engineer!
Code Monkey get up get coffee...
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Um, you would never want to use code from a PhD student...
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hmmm... (Score:4, Interesting)
I suspect those that turned down other university offers for this one, only to find out they weren't accepted and no have no-where to go have basis for a lawsuit. And what about those that had scholarships at other schools and lost them? Mistakes like this, and such a critical point in your life, affect the whole of the rest of your life. It could change the entire trajectory of your career.
Re:hmmm... (Score:5, Informative)
I suspect those that turned down other university offers for this one, only to find out they weren't accepted and no have no-where to go...
The email was corrected within 7 hours--pretty unlikely there are any damages to anyone other than the huge disappointment.
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I guess that's Carnegie-mellon's luck then, that they're unlikely to get sued.
7 hours is plenty of time to both recieve multiple acceptances and send back replies politely turning them down.
With hundreds of people, there are bound to be a few.
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Especially since most of this is done online now..
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Nope. I turned down all my other scholarship offers immediately. Now I have nothing...time to begin a life of crime. Now I now how Batman villains feel.
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I dunno, I handed in my notice about five minutes after getting my new job confirmed. Didn't wait 7 hours just to make sure there wasn't a follow up email retracting the offer. Could have been screwed pretty badly if I had been forced to stay at a company that knew I was trying to leave imminently.
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Re: hmmm... (Score:2)
Depends on how you turned them down....
Re:hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait though, given its February I assume these are early acceptances for Fall 2015 semester? I don't recall ever "turning down other offers" of acceptance is that even a thing do people do that? I thought you just let the other offers expire. Those letters usually say you have until a certain date to contact the school about enrolling. Given that its still only February, I suspect most students still have the ability to exercise any other offers they might have gotten.
Well unless they did something stupid like dial up the admissions office at $STATE to say "Suck-it fools I got accepted at Carnegie!"
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I agree for the most part. I did, however, have a small grant based on the school I picked when I went. I had to say "yes" or "no" to, etc... I could see myself calling them and telling them to give it to someone else, etc... I think it's rather unlikely any particular person would find themselves in a situation like that. But there were 800 affected people... the chances go way up once you see that.
Too be honest, it's been decades since I went to school, so I'm probably not the best resource in knowing how
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Wait though, given its February I assume these are early acceptances for Fall 2015 semester? I don't recall ever "turning down other offers" of acceptance is that even a thing do people do that?
I did when I went to grad school. I called the admissions office and politely declined their offer once I got into my #1 choice. I must admit, since the school was our #1 rival at my undergrad it was a bit enjoyable to turn them down; but I felt I ought to let them know as they had people on the waitlist.
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I suspect those that turned down other university offers for this one, only to find out they weren't accepted and no have no-where to go have basis for a lawsuit. And what about those that had scholarships at other schools and lost them? Mistakes like this, and such a critical point in your life, affect the whole of the rest of your life. It could change the entire trajectory of your career.
The article says people who can show actual harm like the situation you just gave (which was also given in TFA) would probably have a good case for a lawsuit. Although they also mention that because the apology email was sent only a few hours after the mistaken acceptance letters were sent, it is unlikely anyone was harmed. Hopefully most students smart enough to get into Carnegie-Mellon are also smart enough to follow due diligence and verify their financial aid is in order before contacting other colleges
Re:hmmm... (Score:4, Funny)
Well most of them were not smart enough to get into Carnegie-Mellon. That's sort of the point.
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Well most of them were not smart enough to get into Carnegie-Mellon. That's sort of the point.
Lol, touche.
Hurts go good... (Score:1)
sorry, blame my dendrite that reached over to the 80's section
"what are the other explanations?" (Score:2, Insightful)
Submitter can't be so dim that "human error" doesn't occur to him, can he?
(Females in the 21st century are too sainted to make this kind of mistake...)
Re:"what are the other explanations?" (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe he works in my building. Nothing is ever anything other than computer error, as far as everyone other than me is concerned.
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How in the world does sexism like that get rated up? If I said "blacks in the 21st century are too sainted to make this kind of mistake" would I get upvoted?
Reminds Me Of My Own Experiences (Score:1)
Weeks passed with no updates. After the deadline for when the
computer error? (Score:1)
"Computer errors" in these situations usually mean a human entered data incorrectly or someone pushed the wrong button; not that a software bug turned 600 rejections into acceptance.
As HAL said: It can only be attributable to human error.
Re:computer error? (Score:4, Funny)
Still, it comes down to an error in their process. I'd bump them down to a CMM Level [wikipedia.org] of 1.
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Depending on who's programming the system, it could have been a programming error. A friend of mine who contracted with MIT for a time said that far too much of the software that ran the school had been written by grad students who didn't bother to leave a copy of the source behind.
WOOHOO, I got in! (Score:5, Funny)
FUCK YOU, Rob, you sad McJob manager! I just got into Carnegie-Mellon's CS program for grad school! So you can SUCK MY DICK, Rob! And that goes for you too Stacey! This motherfucker right here is GOING PLACES, BITCH! So you can shove this smock right up your tight asses! And don't look to see me again, 'cause I'm going to be in Pittsburg getting my Masters on!
Oh look, I just got another letter from them. Must be to congratulate me AGAIN! Let's open it up, so I can shove it right in your FAT FACES!
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This isn't the first time... (Score:2)
When I applied there for undergraduate, I was sent two rejection letters, four months apart.
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They wanted to be damn sure you didn't show up!
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They should honor the acceptances. (Score:2)
If the applicant is seriously underqualified and likely to fail, they should say so, give the specific reasons, and advise them not to enter the program.
Nevertheless, if they've actually sent out an acceptance--if it wasn't a forgery--they should honor the acceptance.
It's the right thing to do.
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Why? Because of an error? Just send your apology mailings, take your black eye and move on.
STEM shortage solved! (Score:2)
Why are we turning away applicants when MILLIONS (no citations provided) of STEM jobs remain unfilled? We just need MORE STEM graduates to stay competitive (no citation provided). Schools are turning away qualified and motivated applicants just to fill affirmative action quotas (No citation provided). We must do something! Think of the children[1]!
(In case you missed it that was sarcasm)
[1] Disclaimer; proper health care, nutrition, primary and secondary not included.
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They're only selecting girls? *ducks*
The problem is that there are too much applications for most "prestigious" schools to fulfill. Everyone with a scholarship or enough money is going to apply to Harvard, Yale, MIT, Carnegie... Even less-prestigious schools have to turn down thousands of applicants yearly. There are simply too many kids and not enough space to educate these kids.
There is no shortage of employees in these fields, I know plenty of people in those fields that are unemployed, both freshly educ
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Simple, just let anyone teach and the number of students that can be educated will increase. And unemployment will be reduced. A win-win!
Just ask for a T-Shirt (Score:2)
CMU isn't going to do anything about this to those affected by this mistake. Their accrediting agency, Middle States Commission on Higher Education, http://www.msche.org/ [msche.org] will make you jump through numerous hoops before doing nothing. If you can get them to pony up a t-shirt, you'll be doing well. Take the t-shirt and move on to Plan B.
How to lose friends and infuriate people (Score:2)
Simple Solution (Score:2)
Accept all 800 students in a newly established online degree program. Inform those who successfully achieve an 3.75 their first year will be granted acceptance onto the campus.
There is no such thing as a "computer error" (Score:2)
They're not saying "computer error," but what are the other explanations?
There is no such thing as a computer error. Either it was user error or the computer was programmed improperly or the computer's hardware was designed/built improperly. ALL of those are human errors. Computers do exactly what they are told to do. Nothing more, nothing less. If the instructions are faulty then the computer will execute those faulty instructions faithfully.
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If there's no such thing as "computer error", then why do we have all this error-correcting stuff in our memory etc.?
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If there's no such thing as "computer error", then why do we have all this error-correcting stuff in our memory etc.?
Because the computer was designed in such a way as to require it. While there are a few problems due to noise in communications channels and unstable storage, these are known physics problems with known solutions. Because we know about the problems any errors are for all practical purposes human mistakes. If you know a problem can occur and don't bother to design around it then that is a human error.
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The term "computer error" doesn't imply that the computer made a mistake on it's own, since computers obviously have no independent judgment. Rather, it's simply used to subdivide all errors between "user errors" and errors found within the hardware or software, or "computer errors". Your argument is akin to saying "There's no such thing as a human, because all humans are actually mammals".
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Okay, what do we do when cosmic rays decide to change the contents of memory into something else that still has the right checksoms or whatever the heck the memory has? No matter how much redundancy you build in, it's possible for cosmic rays to flip the bits just right. It can occur, and it is impossible to completely design around.
Common error - happens every year (Score:1)
Wrong acceptance email happens every year (watch for them from March through April). Often at private K-12 schools, but also at colleges as well.
It has nothing to do with nefarious plots; and it doesn't take an especially stupid person.
Here's a few obvious reasons::
The programs are only run live once a year. An annual relearning exercise
"Accepted Applicants" and "All Applicants" reside in the same database. It's easy to export the wrong selection.
The staff chan
Huh? (Score:2)
Does this joke depend on some fact in TFA? (Which i am unable to read at work.) Are they actually supposed to be accepting some number that is significantly higher or lower than 100? As it is that statement stands out as a total non-sequitur.
Close to Home (Score:1)
This one hits a bit close to home for me. I'm actually just finishing up my PhD in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon. Within a month, I should be Doctor Atog. Getting an acceptance letter like that can be life-changing. I've spent the past six years of my life in Pittsburgh because of being accepted to CMU. This has been an amazing place and I feel very fortunate for the opportunity to have been here. I've had doors opened because of being here, and I've been able to have some very rewarding
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go for it - admit them all. (Score:1)