<p>I was wondering how hard it is to get caught if you falsify some facts on your application. Like what if you:
1. Give yourself ~20 hours more of community service than you actually did
2. Put you were on a sports team for more years than you actually were
3. Put yourself as officers of clubs you weren't officers in
4. Make your SAT 400 points higher and your GPA higher by .5 (jk on this one)</p>
<p>Morally these are all wrong, but how easy are these to get away with?</p>
<p>I don't plan on doing any of this, by the way, it is just out of curiosity.</p>
<p>You could, as they don’t verify on their own, but if any of your facts don’t match up - e.g. someone else lists him/herself as president, they can easily call your school to verify –> automatic rejection. If they find out you falsified your application after you get in, they can rescind your admission and/or expel you if you’ve already started. I’m sure some people do get away with it, but… what goes around comes around.</p>
<p>I agree with pch340. An officer position looks just as good as being an ordinary member of the club. High school club officers don’t do much more, if anything more at all. Everything they do could be done easily by any other member of the club, therefore, it’s just a title that was based on judgment.</p>
<p>KingZant is right. Have you seen some of these kids running for school office? I swear it comes down to “who’s more popular.” No highschooler has the mental capacity to weigh candidates’ academic strengths.</p>
<p>I have participated more than 10 years in two varsity sports, worked my ass off trying to get better and work over limit, wake up at 5 in the morning BEFORE school and jump in ice cold water to practice, and then do the same after school. Altogether, I play sports for MORE THAN 40 HOURS PER WEEK. It *<strong><em>es me off when someone like you tries to cheat and say you are active in a sport and get in, and someone else like me who works hard doesn’t because so many geeks are saying they are more active in sports even though they are studying for the SAT 24/7. This is *</em></strong>ing me so much, I feel like smashing my computer.</p>
<p>“High school club officers don’t do much more, if anything more at all. Everything they do could be done easily by any other member of the club.”</p>
<p>^ I don’t think that’s exactly true. At my school at least, we have to apply, get rec.s, and go through an interviews. =/</p>
<p>I think zakuropanda’s post is pretty much accurate. If you have to make things up for your app, chances are you won’t fit in well at that school anyway</p>
<p>Localorfarway, calm down… -.- He said that he doesn’t plan on cheating and I hope he is being truthful. But, I also would have to agree with you, and it really does tick me off as well.</p>
<p>Colleges don’t look at your GPA, SATs, class rank, on the common app anyway (if you look, they are optional spaces, so you don’t even have to fill it in). They just wait until your transcript and scores from college board are sent.
As for lying about clubs and activities, they most likely won’t check, but that’s something you’ll have to deal with morally.</p>
<p>I don’t think that’s exactly true. At my school at least, we have to apply, get rec.s, and go through an interviews. =/</p>
<p>^ We apply at my school too, and sometimes need recommendations and go through interviews, but it doesn’t defeat the fact that any work done by an officer could pretty much be done by any other ordinary member, and sometimes, those ordinary members make better leaders than the ones chosen. In high school, the electing of leadership positions is biased and judgmental a lot of the time, making the position not much of an accomplishment. Admission officers know it as well, or at least I hope they do.</p>
<p>This dudes a *<strong><em>ing cheater. Who would ever want to just know how much someone can get away with cheating for fun? Thought you guys would be smarter and not help this *</em></strong>ing idiot cheat. </p>
<p>“Morally these are all wrong, but how easy are these to get away with?
I don’t plan on doing any of this, by the way, it is just out of curiosity.”</p>
<p>^His wording is so *<strong><em>ing obvious too. Probably has a list of fakes made up already…
Just ruins my *</em></strong>ing day and my athletic life.</p>
<p>I had a kid I knew in my school that had perfect grades and sat scores and everything but he listed him in an officer position for a bunch of clubs and harvard called to verify and he was caught and blacklisted from all the ivies and wound up at georgetown</p>
<p>@Localorfarway Yes I definitely plan on cheating. I plan on putting I have been on varsity all 4 years for 3 different sports. Can you give me some advice on what 3 sports I should lie about? Like which sport did you do that was so hard, so I can pretend I worked just as hard as you, get all the credit, without doing any of the work?</p>
<p>So it seems the risks do not outweigh the benefits at all. I mean, a few club positions most likely will not be the deciding factor of getting into a school, am I right?</p>
<p>Now I’m curious, how many of you know people that have falsified a little information? How many of you plan on doing so yourself?</p>
<p>There isn’t really a way to check this. However, the number of hours you do is entirely arbitrary. This would make no difference at all in your application.</p>
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<p>This could be checked fairly easily, so you could be screwed by this. It probably would provide only a minimal advantage.</p>
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<p>This could be checked and would provide no advantage. Officer positions in high school are generally arbitrary titles. They only provide a significant advantage if your application manages to indicate that you actually did something with them (e.g. you write an essay about it or you list that you were the founder).</p>
<p>Regardless of how risky it is, you shouldn’t lie on your applications. It’s wrong. If you do it, I hope you don’t get caught during admissions, because you deserve to get caught and thrown out at the end of your senior year.</p>
<p>If an applicant pads their application a little bit … adding a few hours of community service or adding a club membership … it won’t likely got caught but it also won’t make a big difference.</p>
<p>If the applicant pads their application in a big way … claiming a state level awards from competitions … then the lie might actually help their application however the odds of getting caught go way up. The school may check the EC, a recommendation may contradict the application, someone reviewing the application may be aware of the competition and the claim may look fishy, or the whole application package may just no hang together right … so this student claims to be a genius but no other ECs are related, no recommendations mention this skill, and why aren’t any of the essays related to this?</p>
<p>However much lying may help, to me, the downside of getting caught is just way too severe to risk the chance. Lie found while application is being reviewed could result in rejection, lie found after acceptance and while attending school could result in being thrown out of school, and the kicker lie found after graduating and the result could be rescinding the degree. Is adding a few hours of community service worth the risk of having your degree rescinded however unlikely that is to occur?</p>
<p>Finally, as a parent, I need to add this one … one of my favorite saying. The true test on one’s character is what they do when no one is looking. Would it really help to never know if you got into a school because of your won accomplishments or because of your lie?</p>