Does changing your name on facebook really hide you from colleges?

Pre-College Issues High School Life
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<p>Sorry if someone already made a thread about this already... and I hope this is the right place to put it. </p>

<p>I'm a senior now, and maybe it's because I come from a party school (where I live, it's extremely easy to get a fake ID and get into clubs and bars without being questioned), but lots of my classmates have been changing their names to something crazy and far from their real names in attempts to hide themselves from colleges. I've wondered that, can a simple name change on Facebook really hide your past? I've thought that since your real name was already associated with pictures or wall posts of illegal activities, a name change wouldn't do much... And also, do colleges even have enough time to look through every applicant's Facebook? Do they have some sort of program that allows them to look at our Facebook, even when it's privated? Have any of you ever tried changing your name?</p>

<p>Edit - Also, just to add another question... maybe I'm thinking too much, but I've always wondered, what if a college looked you up and saw a picture/wall post/any activity on FB and misinterpreted it as something bad?</p>

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<p>You don’t need to change your name to hide yourself from colleges. You can just change your options so that no one can search for you in the search function. And you can change all your settings to “Friends Only” so only your friends can see your photos, wall posts, etc. so that in the event that someone does come up with your profile, they will see nothing but your default picture (unable to be clicked through the profile picture album if you change your settings to “Friends Only” for all photo albums), Name, the networks you are in.</p>

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<p>I’ve heard that even that doesn’t work, that somehow colleges can get past that… Thought that was illegal, though (for colleges to do that).</p>

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<p>I mean, hacking into someone’s profile is illegal, as far as I’m aware, so I doubt any college would attempt that for risk of being caught. </p>

<p>I was also told that colleges will generally only resort to checking up on someone’s facebook if they’re second-guessing their decision to accept them, or if that person is in competition for a spot.</p>