<p>Now's the time. If you wouldn't want an adcom to see it, get it off of your Facebook:</p>
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A new survey of 500 top colleges found that 10% of admissions officers acknowledged looking at social-networking sites to evaluate applicants. Of those colleges making use of the online information, 38% said that what they saw "negatively affected" their views of the applicant.
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<p>College</a> Applicants, Beware: Your Facebook Page Is Showing - WSJ.com</p>
<p>I have my profile set to friends only, so they’d have to add me as a friend to see my profile…</p>
<p>Most people have their profile set to “friends only” so they would only see your profile picture (unless its a party picture thats bad) but other than that, I don’t think most have to worry… they can’t access the information.</p>
<p>Right, most do have it set to friends only, but some don’t. People tend not to think about that after a while, so this was just a friendly reminder for those who might need to update.</p>
<p>Also, you gotta watch that profile pic. I have a friend who owns a small business; she was all set to hire a respectable-seeming young lady until she saw the girl’s profile pic which was, shall we say, not so respectable. The girl didn’t get the job.</p>
<p>On Facebook, go to:</p>
<p>Settings
Privacy Settings
Search</p>
<p>Under “Search Result Content” you can choose not to have your picture appear when someone searches for you. You can also set it so that no one can search for you. I have my security set to the max and prefer a few dozen friends and closer friends than hundreds of people I barely know. And, I purge every few months.</p>
<p>My profile only appears in Search to those who are in my high school network, which is already very limited. On top of that, they would also not be able to see my profile picture, or the rest of my profile for that matter, and would have to send me a friend request in order to do so.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t mind them looking at my facebook at all.</p>
<p>One thing to consider is making 2 different Facebook profiles. One for you and your friends (set to friends only) and one for college admissions officers/potential employers. A lot of people see this and hide from it, but if you embrace it, you can use your pseudo-account to represent yourself in a very positive way to admissions officers/employers rather than have them assume you’re up to no good.</p>
<p>Honestly, I have to agree with sanguinity to an extent. Would I mind it? Absolutely. Would it hurt me at all? No. My Facebook is remarkably tame because I am, well, a remarkably tame person. My friends are the same, and we’re pretty good about posting kosher stuff there. But I don’t mind if you have some crazy stuff on Facebook. Just take the right precautions. A non-Facebook account may not be able to view the information on your profile, but check to make sure that “friends of friends” also can’t. If you have friends with thousands of other friends, think about how many people have access to potentially very personal information. I recently changed all my security features to friends only rather than friends of friends, because a friend of mine from a college visit has almost 800 friends. I don’t want an extra 800 people with access to a lot of my information. But if you don’t mind it, just keep in mind what is getting posted. Use common sense, but most of all, use safety and security settings.</p>
<p>haha, changing your settings won’t do anything. It’s widely known that universities/ companies can BUY information from facebook. They don’t have to even friend you to see your account.</p>
<p>I actually feel that FB is a much more accurate picture of a student than anything. else…like essays or test scores.</p>
<p>^^^You are saying facebook is a good indicator of personality, test scores, athletic ability, writing abilities, and academic performance? What would be unique about your facebook from others? More friends? Most wall posts?</p>
<p>itry, No, I didn’t say that FB is a good indicator of essays and test scores. It shows kids as social kids, and what’s important to them. </p>
<p>Do you think your essay is a better “picture” of who you are, or does a page from FB? Essays that are read over and over by you and most likely by a teacher, or Facebook, that’s straight from you.</p>
<p>I don’t really understand why college admissions officers would waste their time searching your name on Facebook. Unless they want to accept the most attractive students…? Really, you can’t see much except profile pics on FB unless you friend people (even then, it’d be a waste of time). I don’t think many people have inappropriate pictures accessible to the public anyway.</p>
<p>Facebook is not a good indicator of anything, IMO. It’s not even a very good indicator of how social you are. I know a pariah with about 1,000 friends!</p>
<p>I don’t think any adcom could get a negative opinion of me from my FB. There are no party photos, none of my wall posts are risqu</p>
<p>I actually use facebook to make a fool of myself, because everyone I friend knows me in real life.
How I use FB: 60% school/ academic, 30% confirming events/ secondary email, 10% what I do when I am bored.
And there is a HUGE difference from being social and having many friends on FB. In fact, some people have alot of friends on FB because they do not have much of a life out of it.
Considering most officers take no more than 5-10 minutes on each application, I do not know how much time they would have after reading application, essay, supplemental work.
And also, Limabeans, there is alot more your essay shows about you than what you put in (style can definitely describe a person) optimism, etc. So yes, an essay does say more about you than anything else.</p>
<p>“Having 1,000 friends” isn’t the same has having conversations and planning events and joking with friends. </p>
<p>Bet a FB page from your colleague, the pariah, wouldn’t be nearly as active and “fun” as yours. Go on and see. Look at them from the viewpoint of an adcom (and compare). I’m going to check my son’s page now. He’s a very social kid. Wonder what he’s got on his page. Hmmmm</p>
<p>And yes, I do hope the essay tells a lot about you. It’s your chance to express who you are. I suppose FB is just another way to see that student as a kid.</p>
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<p>Yes, but that would be in the running for #1 biggest waste of money of the year… since they’d also have to hire or pay people to look over all that information. Colleges are receiving probably 30 pages from every applicant already. Multiply that by 20,000 and the number is already astronomical. Multiply that by, what, at least five pages of Facebook information? Even at a few seconds each, that takes a LONG TIME to process (and even longer to derive anything important from). I mean, what could be so bad about your Facebook page? Maybe you drink, party excessively, or smoke pot. Well, no college administrator could believe that isn’t happening on their campus (at least not most colleges) and that it won’t continue to happen. So, that wouldn’t be what they are looking for. Poor grammar or spelling? That knocks out 95% of people who use the internet. Possibly heavy drug use, but how many people are advertising their forays into the land of LSD or cocaine on their Facebook? Cheating? They’d probably have to read through a lot to come to that conclusion. And then we’re back to square one: it takes too long.</p>
<p>Social kid in what way? FB or real life? there is a difference. You can tell if a kid is a social person by the ECs they do and how involved they are with other people. FB is not productive AT ALL (exceptions to work, projects, etc.). GREAT way to waste time though, if thats what you mean.</p>
<p>Applicannot, look at my first post on the page. I agree with you COMPLETELY. I was just saying that they can access your FB without friending you, which there was a conversation about earlier.</p>