Image Credit – dannydillen.com
Many students see graduation as the time to buckle down and clean up their social media footprint. It’s their first step into the real world. Time to put on the business suit of the virtual world in order to make a good impression. This mindset, although good in theory, isn’t early enough to take control of their digital identity.
According to a 2012 survey of university admissions counselors by Kaplan, 27% of admissions counselors Google prospective candidates and 26% look up students on Facebook. Most importantly, 35% “said that when checking up on a student’s online presence, they found something that negatively impacted an applicant’s chances of getting in”. These numbers will only grow as social media becomes the new standard for vetting. In a May 31st article on Buzzfeed, university admissions track student created social media content before they offered admission. Buzzfeed interviewed an admissions councilor in the northeast US to discuss their universities policies regrading online identities of students.
As students are becoming more concerned about their online privacy they tend to be drifting away from or locking down their Facebook profiles. The more serious errors in judgement often happens on networks which may or may not be linked to their real name such as Tumblr and Twitter. Students will tag posts or tweets with the name of the university and then make a statement about their desire (or lack of) to attend. Admissions counselors regularly check these tags and if they are writing negative remarks about the school, it reflects poorly on a students chance of acceptance. Even if a real name isn’t tied to the account counselors claim to “[have ways to] know who it is”.
At the end of the interview, the admissions councilor confessed that social media was a double edged sword. Her students could also find her networks and embarrassing things she had done. It seems you are never too old or too young to care about your online identity.
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