<p>At a recent parents' night at the high school, an official told a story of a student in a prior year--the story is that one of the student's colleges called the guidance office after receiving an anonymous e-mail accusing the student (falsely) of cheating in high school. The high school did damage control, called the colleges to say it wasn't true, etc. What impact this had on the kid's applications wasn't made clear. The moral (apparently) was not to tell everybody where you are applying to prevent this from happening. It was already too late for that for most of the seniors, though.</p>
<p>My question is this: what would a college admissions office really do upon receiving such an anonymous message? Ignore it? Contact the high school? It seems impossible (to me, anyway) that they would take such an accusation at face value. That's what I told my D, anyway. Thoughts?</p>
<p>How could they possibly take anonymous accusations at face value? I’m sure they know that there are all kinds of unscrupulous losers who want to discredit competitors and will go to any lengths to do so. To me, the bigger fear would be a competitor who mocks up an email that looks “legit” (e.g., like a GC at a high school) to make a false accusation, so that the school thinks it’s corresponding with a GC and doesn’t actually pick up the phone and call.</p>