Summary: Students at the University of Virginia School of Law received an email last week that included a spreadsheet of confidential information regarding their clerkships.
Back in the month of June, an administrator from the University of Virginia mistakenly sent a spreadsheet to the entire clerkship email discussion group at the law school that contained the class rank of the students, according to the ABA Journal.
The spreadsheet also had clerkship applicants’ summer jobs listed and the names of the people who provided the students with their recommendations.
The data from the spreadsheet also shows that a grade point average of B at the law school puts the student in the bottom quarter of the entire class.
An email from an administrator included the following apology for the data mishap:
“We take the safeguarding of your personal information very seriously and will conduct a full review of our communication practices and our management of confidential student information,” the email apology said. “We ask that you please do not open this attachment and that you immediately delete this email if you have not done so already.”
A spokeswoman from the school said the following to the ABA Journal about the issue:
“Yesterday, a UVA Law School administrator sent an email to approximately 160 law students that mistakenly attached a spreadsheet containing student information. The spreadsheet included grade point averages, class ranks and biographical information for 155 students who are applying for clerkships. It did not include social security numbers or financial information.
“The dean and other Law School officials have apologized and reached out individually to all of the affected students. We are deeply distressed that this mistake occurred, and we are in the process of reviewing our data management procedures to build in more safeguards against unintentional disclosures.”
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