A university in Delaware issued an apology to multiple students after accidentally sending out an e-mail to the entire student body with the names and grade point averages of failing students.
An administrator at Wesley College accidentally sent the e-mail, which was meant to be sent to several administrators across campus to see if they could help the 18 students whose grade point averages were below a 1.0, according to Eric Nelson, vice president for finance at Wesley College.
At one point the author of the e-mail described how much academic trouble one student was in by saying “The hole she has dug is deeper than the mine shaft in Chile.”
“The gentleman that wrote the e-mail is a very colorful person and has a tendency to say things like this. He is not offensive and was not trying to make light of anything but was just trying to get people’s attention to see if they could help these students,” Nelson said.
Nelson said the administrator realized the mistake and contacted their technology support staff who immediately retracted the e-mail. However, Nelson said, the e-mail was already viewed by a dozen or so students and they are unsure how many copies were made.
A similar mistake happened earlier this month at Winston-Salem State University in North Carolina when an administrator sent out a mass e-mail to students encouraging them to vote for democratic candidates in the upcoming elections without reviewing the e-mail first.
This kind of mistake could not happen at the University of Wisconsin, according to Phillip Hull, institution reporter for the Office of the Registrar.
Hull said UW does not have any master lists set up where an administrator could plug in the list and send an e-mail to everyone.
However, Hull said student’s e-mails are public records so anyone can request to get the information.
Hull added when the administration needs to send out e-mails to everyone on campus, like a letter from the chancellor, they contact the Division of Information Technology who collects all the students e-mails and puts them into a program.
Nelson said the university had not violated the Family Education Rights Privacy Act, which protects student’s privacy because it was a one-time error and not a pattern of abuse.
