<p>Does anyone think it's a total violation of privacy? I mean, facebook really has NOTHING to do with academic life...</p>
<p>Nope.</p>
<p>It's public information as long as it's on a public listing, whether it be affiliated with a region or whatnot. Facebook has the option to make it private -- it's a person's own fault for not reading through the guides. Colleges don't intrude upon privacy via, say, hacking into your account or anything. Anything short of that you make available yourself.</p>
<p>ok, but i don't think a student's personal life should be criteria for admission.</p>
<p>a superstudent who might do less than savory things during the summer doesn't deserve to be discriminated against just bcs there are a few incriminating pics on their facebook.</p>
<p>They're not technically "discriminated against." They just leave a bad impression that may or may not affect admission. Remember that colleges are trying to know the person, and that no one has a "right" to attend a school. If there are incriminating photos, well, that says something about someone.</p>
<p>Oh come on... if you were hiring and you had a better chance to see what the guy was like, wouldn't you take it?</p>
<p>No, I don't think it's a violation of privacy. In fact, I applaud schools and employers for using these websites to their advantages.</p>
<p>And no, colleges don't admit you solely based on your academic life. Hence the letters of recommendation, the essays, etc., so I say it's free game. It's your own fault for putting less than positive information about yourself on the web and open to the public. Don't want people to know? Set your profile to private or hey, don't put it up in the first place.</p>
<p>
[quote]
ok, but i don't think a student's personal life should be criteria for admission.
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</p>
<p>Here's the flaw in your argument: it's not.
There's only one case of an admissions officer saying they rejected someone because of something they saw on facebook. The adcom didn't 'snoop' - they had been tipped off by some other source.</p>
<p>If you're really that paranoid, make you're profile private. I really don't get why people don't do that anyway... while there's nothing on my facebook that could be considered bad, I don't want the world to be able to see it.</p>
<p>^Agreed. People have the freedom to make a profile but the good sense not to be crazy with it. It's not like there's a need to delete that "Reading is Sexy" bumper sticker--adcoms aren't Nazis--but if your friends keep sending you stickers about <em>ahem</em> certain sexual activites, even in good humor, just set your profile to private. If your profile is not made private and is inappropriate for an adcom to view, that adcom is probably the least of your worries: What does everyone else viewing that page think of you? Goodness.</p>
<p>I don't think this happens as much as you'd think. With thousands of applicants, adcoms really don't have the time (or interest) to snoop around on social networks to discover more about a potential candidate. Even if they do, I highly doubt it has much of an effect on admissions.</p>
<p>If adcoms do that, they need a life.</p>
<p>wait...can't you just set your facebook thingy to private?</p>
<p>facebook is no different from a blog, which anyone can see. So if they want to check your account, I don't see why not. If it's an issue for you, make it private.</p>
<p>As many intelligent people have pointed out, use the damn privacy option and allow your profile to only be seen by your friends and don't make your profile picture one of you doing coke.</p>
<p>First of all, why would colleges even go look you up on facebook? They literally have 5-10 min per applicant. They'd rather spend that time reading your essays/etc.</p>
<p>lol wow, so many people are giving me lip
here's a shocker:
I don't have a facebook</p>
<p>oh wasnt that a waste of time? You think you're clever? Ure gonna be hated all over this forum now :]</p>
<p>The admissions officers do whatever the **** they want. Since I'm Chinese, I don't use my legal name on Facebook so they probably can't find my profile if they tried. I'm also out of their networks so they can't see my profile in case they do find it. Profile pic is nothing more than a picture of my face.</p>
<p>It's no damn invasion of privacy. It's your fault for making a public profile in the first place.</p>
<p>I don't have one bcs I deleted it days after making the post.</p>
<p>it sounds bad, but honestly I am fine with it. If you're leaving your profile PUBLIC, you should assume that everybody can read it---I have mine on private and there's nothing BAD-I just don't want to have it all out there.</p>
<p>Also, there are a lot of times when it isn't just your "WilDIi aNd KrAZIi" party antics, but serious lies. For example, I know a girl who said she volunteered in an African country for three weeks. However, she was at home, partying it up and captioned all her photos making fun of how she was getting away with the "african country helping people" lie...I wouldn't tip off a college officer to this, but if it happened that they found out, I wouldn't be heartbroken.</p>
<p>haha honestly, if it was to keep someone out of a college that I wanted to attend and up my chances, I'm all for it. People just have to use their heads.</p>