<p>Now I have no intention of lying on my applications, but I am curious as to how admissions officers go about detecting liars. Does anyone here know? Is there any real way colleges can go about verifying the truthfulness of applications? I know some people who have stretched the truth a little bit, but not blatantly lie on their apps. Are they in any danger of being caught?</p>
<p>to paraphrase what Northstarmom has written, small lies may not be detected but they're also too small to make any difference to your chances. Bigger lies are easily detected.</p>
<p>Ya! If the lie is small, then it probably wouldn't bring a lot to the application anyhow. I think a small lie would include uping your hours/activity by like 2 hours/week, or something miniscule as that.</p>
<p>A bigger lie that would definitely get you caught would be one such as including that you're a Siemens Westinghouse Finalist when you weren't. It is something that would boost your application to the accepted pile. It will get you automatically get you rejected when the college adcoms researched that you actually didn't get past regionals.</p>
<p>I would never truely make something up, EVER, and put it on an application...however, if you work 18 hours or so for your mom's business filing papers, and say you worked 20 at a business firm on a company-wide project, thats not a lie, you're just leaving out a bit of info and being a bit broader...however, if you go an say you played with an all-state band and were an Eagle Scout and did research at NIH, they'll probably inquire</p>
<p>if they find out you lied, you're doomed...automatic rejection, and they probably wont take you as a transfer either</p>
<p>small lies won't hurt, but if you say you eat lunch with president Bush everyday in Iraq and he's giving you permission to sign some papers, then the admission office might wanna call Air Force 1 and ask if the president is actually in Iraq everyday. Or they might call directly the president to find out ... :D</p>
<p>Ah.. unfortunately, they can't really tell unless it's a major major lie. I know a guy who got into Princeton even though he completely lied about almost all his ECs.</p>
<p>And I know a girl who got into a decent (but not top) school who blatantly lied about everything in her commonapp essay and still got in.</p>