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Boston's Morning Newsletter
Northeastern (again) mistakenly sends some applicants acceptance emails
Editor's Note: This is an excerpt from WBUR's daily morning newsletter, WBUR Today. If you like what you read and want it in your inbox, sign up here.
I don’t usually kick off this newsletter by quoting the Steamship Authority, but this Monday is “déjà vu all over again.” We have another wet and windy start to the week, with the most heavy rain and damaging gusts this morning. Thousands are without power, most MBTA ferries are canceled and officials are warning commuters to drive carefully.
The good news is the weather should settle down this afternoon. The rest of the week is also looking much quieter and drier. Read meteorologist Danielle Noyes’ full forecast of what to expect today here.
Now, to the news:
Another reason for déjà vu: For the second year in a row, Northeastern University has mistakenly sent out acceptance emails to grad school applicants. As NBC Boston first reported yesterday, school officials say “due to a technical error,” 48 applicants for master’s degree programs got emails incorrectly telling them they had been accepted. “They were immediately contacted by the university to clarify the mistake,” a Northeastern spokesperson said. (According to NBC Boston, one applicant said it took a week to get the correction.)
- The erroneous emails don’t necessarily mean the applicants weren’t accepted. Northeastern says they’re still reviewing the applications and plan to make final decisions next month.
- Zoom out: It’s worth noting the emails were sent to only a small slice of the nearly 64,000 applicants for master’s degrees programs. It’s unclear what Northeastern is doing to prevent such errors from happening again.
- Flashback: Last fall, Northeastern sent mistaken acceptance emails to more than 200 pending law school applicants, plus nearly 4,000 applicants who had applied the previous year.
Orange you glad: Some MBTA riders may not have to wait quite as long this morning. Beginning this week, the T’s new winter schedule takes effect, with slightly more frequent service for the Red and Orange lines (though still nowhere close to their pre-pandemic frequencies).
- During rush hours, Orange Line trains will run every seven-to-eight minutes, compared to the every nine-to-1o minutes this fall. The average weekday Red Line wait will also drop a minute to every eight-to-nine minutes. It’s not much, but it is something.
Meanwhile on the North Shore: After going over a year without train service, the city of Lynn’s temporary commuter rail stop opens today. (Here are the details on its location.) Newburyport/Rockport Line trains will stop at the makeshift station until Lynn’s permanent, reconstructed commuter rail station opens in 2030.
- PSA: The opening also means the MBTA is no longer running a free shuttle between Lynn and Swampscott’s commuter rail station.
- Fun fact: The platform is opening nine months earlier than planned. According to The Boston Globe, that’s partly because crews were able to use leftover parts from the Big Dig.
Deadline day: Gov. Maura Healey is facing her first deadline this week for enhanced reporting on the strained state shelter system. Under the supplemental budget she signed earlier this month, the Healey administration must regularly disclose how many families and new immigrants are in the shelters, how much the state is spending on the system and the number of families on waitlists. The first report, which state lawmakers plan to make public, is due tomorrow.
- What’s new? The state already has a dashboard showing some of this, but it doesn’t show how many of the families are recent immigrants. (Healey has estimated it’s about half.)
Good to know: Don’t expect Healey to pull a Bill Weld or Paul Cellucci. The Massachusetts governor told the Boston Herald in an interview published Sunday that she would not accept a job in a potential second Biden administration, if offered. While Healey said Biden has been a “great partner,” she said she’s happy as governor.
P.S.— If you missed Saturday’s 250th anniversary reenactment of the Boston Tea Party, you can still watch the entire event on YouTube. (If you’re strapped for time and just want to watch some boxes of tea splash into the water, fast-forward to the 1:18:30 mark.)
