<p>Sanitized email addresses created for application purposes can be a wise choice. Most college officials would prefer to think that they are admitting ChessChamp10 and MarieCurie2B and not XBox24-7 or KeggerBabe69. Commonly, seniors are told to opt for an application addy with a professional ring that includes their real name or initialsand its good advice indeed, but only if this new account gets a regular look.</p>
<p>In todays text-message and Facebook culture, teenagers may not religiously read any email they receive. Ive seen my son, who is 13, respond to texts in a nanosecond, even as he crosses streets (yes, a separate discussion for another day), while his unread emails pile up by the dozen. </p>
<p>So it is even less likely that students will regularly check the faux addresses that theyve concocted for admission offices. Yet it is via these addresses that they may receive critical college missives informing them about interview opportunities, pending prospective-student events, admission-staff visits in their local area, and--above all--missing materials.</p>
<p>Thus, although you may have spent years steering your child away from electronics, this could be the time to issue occasional reminders about the importance of staying on top of whatever email account was listed on college applications.</p>
<p>We set up email accounts for each of our sons as they started the college app process (ex: <a href="mailto:johncollegeapp@gmail.com">johncollegeapp@gmail.com</a>) they can use it starting with the psat and for every college related site that they go to. I have the password, since there is nothing “personal” being sent or received - they don’t mind my checking it every once in a while. SHOULD they be responsible enough to be on top of it themselves? Absolutely, but in our world this is what works.</p>
<p>Every spring I hear from at least a couple of unhappy parents whose children were expecting admission verdicts that never arrived because missing-materials notifications sent to the students via email went unanswered. Unfortunately, some kids rarely check any email account, and those who do may not think to check spam filters (which is where this college stuff is apt to land).</p>
<p>I did the same thing. Works great. And, there have been times that they needed to follow up on something- say a document missing. I could send the inquiry from their email and it looks like it is coming from a responsible young adult rather than a helicopter mom (me!)</p>
<p>Our kids school gives them their own email address so the address is straight forward <a href="mailto:jstudent@school.org">jstudent@school.org</a>. However, our Jr D is ridiculous about keeping it “clean” and uses a similar gmail account (aka JStudent@gmail). That way, it’s still her name, but she doesnt seem to get any junk sent to her school account. Hopefully, she’ll start using it more for outside contacts when the college process gets more concrete, but for now it is what it is…</p>
<p>D2 is an email kid, so she set up the professional email and checked it obsessively.</p>
<p>D3 is a phone kid, so she set up the professional email, linked it to her regular email and gave me the password and encouraged me to check it (whirring helicopter blades silently in background)…but she was concerned enough to keep checking, especially when deadlines were looming.</p>
<p>Now that she’s a freshperson, she just emailed me to give me permission to log on to have a look at something her professor sent her. Not sure whether to be pleased or irritated!</p>
<p>This was actually brought up by one very tactful admissions rep at an information tour we were at. The message was, set up an account for college using a more professional name. When our kids hit hs we set them all up with an account as <a href="mailto:firstlast@xyz.com">firstlast@xyz.com</a> . It was easier to give to teachers, coaches, friends, and most of all colleges. We checked it often during college app/admit days and moved anything important into a ‘folder’. I can’t tell you how many times one would go nuts looking for an email and I would forward my copy. I also had them ‘bcc’ my account on anything they sent out to schools so I’d have a complete record. It came in handy more than once.</p>
<p>Use a Gmail account. It can be forwarded to any mail account. It can also be used as POP. It’s free to do this where as Yahoo and other free mail services charge for it.</p>
<p>We set up the college app gmail account to forward to ME and then I forwarded them on to him. We both knew what was being received and when.</p>
<p>Ditto for the above advice. This worked well for us 4 years ago. S wasn’t great about checking email and I think kids relying on texting and fb is even worse now. I didn’t care if people said my blades were whirring; I knew who would be paying for the helicopter. I wasn’t going to have him miss a deadline or have a necessary bit of info for f/a missing.</p>
<p>Our d’s school gives all their students an email account, too, but I need to remember to ask if they get to keep them through the summer. I know we will be receiving orientation material by email this summer. Does anyone have any experience with this?</p>
<p>Thank goodness my son is already a freshman, and not a HS senior because about two weeks ago, two separate emails went out to his admissions reps from his email account. The email was a link to a Canadian prescription pharmacy selling viagra. No joke! Interestingly, there was no record that these emails went out. Nothing in his “sent” box. </p>
<p>He did get a few responses, saying… “Thank you for your interest in XX University. Due to an overwhelming numbers of emails I receive each day, I will respond in the order they arrived.” Unfortunately, his email address is his name, not “<a href="mailto:skierbum@gmail.com”>skierbum@gmail.com</a>".</p>
<p>Limabeans - that is very interesting. My son had the exact same emails go out from his account this week as well. We were baffled and now seeing the connection - I wonder if someone has been hacking into CollegeBoard or CommonAp for students’ emails…</p>
<p>We did trace the email to an IP address in Israel. Maddening.</p>
<p>Senior year may be too late to set up a “college” email account, especially if they start to go to visits and info sessions early. (We started sophomore year). Once a college has an email address, it can be hard to change it. So, hopefully parents and sophomores and juniors will read this to.</p>
<p>(For S1, I knew his password. I never sent an email out in his name, but I did check his account more often than he did, and then nagged him if necessary. S2 would not let me have his password, so once a week, I had him log in while I looked over his shoulder and helped flag the items he had to respond to. His addy was sportsfan related, and I don’t think it impacted any of his admissions decisions.)</p>
<p>Any person can send an e-mail “from” any name and any e-mail address.</p>
<p>More than likely, the university got a virus and the virus uploaded to the server a list of all the e-mail addresses and names of people who were in their Outlook. It then used this list and sent e-mails to the university as being from these people.</p>
<p>It is interesting how quickly e-mail is becoming “old school” with the kids. My oldest used e-mail and still does much more than 2 and now number 3 never uses e-mail. We set up a new e-mail account and jointed monitored it with number 2 which was his request.</p>
<p>I would say that if you have a student who is not “good” about monitoring the e-mail box, set up a new one just for college and both parent and student access. This is the “type” of helicoptering that I don’t find offensive. If you really don’t want to “read” your students email at the very least you can tell them “you have an e-mail from xyz, better read it” which is no different than 3 decades ago when parents would set the letter aside when the mail arrived at the house and say to the student “a letter came from xyz it’s on the kitchen counter.”</p>
<p>While I agree with setting up a more professional email account the idea of a parent sending emails posing as the student is over the line. Wow.</p>
<p>D is aware that I know her email password and check it. She misses things at times and appreciates having reminders from me about homework or college things. I am going to have to talk to her about deleting large volumes of emails from schools she isn’t interested in. Having 10 to 11 schools she is interested in sending her emails, along with emails from her extracurricular activities, coaches, staff on the newspaper she edits, her debate partner, etc, etc, is enough to overwhelm her. She doesn’t need tons of emails from every school under the sun to which she is not applying.</p>