<p>The more and more that social networking becomes prevalent in today's society, the more and more information about an individual becomes exposed to the public. As students apply to colleges, it has been revealed that admissions officers do a bit of research on prospective students by looking at their facebook page, twitter account, etc. (as shown by this article here: 80%</a> Of College Admissions Officers Use Facebook To Check Out Students )</p>
<p>My topic of discussion for everybody is, how can social networking influence a person's chances of getting accepted or not? What if a student were to follow an admissions officer's twitter feed (that isn't affiliated with the university)? It's pretty safe to say that profile pictures with obscene or tasteless content in them (so long as they're allowed under the website's rules) could hurt a student's chances of being admitted. Would the same rules for a student "friending" his teacher on facebook apply here? What are your philosophies on this topic?</p>
<p>It’s hard to imagine an admissions officer checking out the Facebook profile of every applicant they evaluate. With the number of applications, transcripts, essays, teacher recs, etc. they have to read through, it just doesn’t seem like they’d have the time. And besides, it’s not always that simple to find someone on Facebook. Have you ever tried searching for an Ashley Johnson or a Zach Smith? There can be hundreds of them, and it’s not uncommon to have several people with the same name at a particular high school. How would an admissions officer know they’re looking at the right person?</p>
<p>I don’t doubt that it happens. Perhaps some or even most admissions officers look at Facebook profiles “on occassion”. But I’d guess it happens with less frequency than this article suggests. Still, it’s always wise to be careful about what one posts online. That’s just common sense.</p>
<p>I will say that the Facebook information exchange can go both ways when it comes to college decisions. For example… when my daughter was accepted to one of her top choice schools, she joined a FB group for admitted students. After reading the other students’ posts - which mainly focused on how much partying they’d be doing, what kind of partying, and which dorms had the best parties - she decided that that school was probably not for her. Had it not been for that FB group, she might’ve ended up enrolling there.</p>