Facebook profiles are now fair game to college and graduate school admissions officers. An annual survey of 320 colleges conducted by the test preparation corporation Kaplan, Inc. found that 10 percent of undergraduate admissions officers surveyed had personally viewed applicants’ online profiles from social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace. The survey also showed that 85 percent of the universities surveyed do not have an official policy regarding the use of social networking sites.
Jeff Olson, executive director of research for Kaplan Test Prep and Admissions, said this year a new question on social networking sites was added to the survey.
“The usage of Myspace and Facebook is approaching the use of the telephone,” Olson said. “There are lots of ramifications of that, and of course one is the college admissions process.”
UT was one of the universities surveyed, but Kaplan is not permitted to disclose survey results from individual universities.
“We don’t use that particular platform to review applicants to the University,” said Augustine Garza, deputy director of admissions at UT.
Garza said in just reading the files given in the application — essays, resumes, recommendations and high school transcripts — his admissions staff does not have time to devote attention to other factors such as Facebook profiles.
An anonymous former UT admissions employee said, via Facebook message, that he or she did not personally know of anyone in UT admissions viewing an applicant’s Facebook or Myspace page, during his or her time of employment.
“In general, there are so many applications to go through every year that there really isn’t time to do that kind of ‘in-depth’ research on applicants even if an employee wanted to,” the former employee said. “I’ve really never heard or observed anyone looking at anything about a student that was not an official document sent via the student.”
A different survey of top law schools at Kaplan also showed that 15 percent of schools surveyed reported having visited an applicant’s social networking site.
“It’s slightly more prevalent in law schools,” Olson said. “There is a higher ethics bar in law schools, so it may not be surprising that they are looking at these sites. Also with law school admissions, since they don’t generally do interviews, all they see is the application, so they don’t have as much information as medical school applications and may need the extra information.”
Monica Ingram, assistant dean of admissions in the UT School of Law, said the law school has no official policy on looking at social networking sites and there is currently no discussion toward implementing such a policy.
“It is not a routine step in the applications review process,” Ingram said. “However, since they are in the public domain we do reserve the right to visit the sites if there is something that comes to the attention that may be questionable. It would be an outgrowth of the application.”
Olson said students should utilize their profiles’ privacy settings to keep unwanted information from being made public.
Psychology junior Rachael Dayton said it is worrisome to think some admissions officers look at students’ social networking profiles.
“One of my main fears would be that they would see my pictures,” Dayton said. “I don’t think it would help a student at all, and it would probably be a good idea for there to be a rule against using the site for admissions.”
Biology sophomore Jessica Villanueva, though, said she agrees with admissions officers’ use of these sites.
“I think it’s a good idea because it’s so easy to bullshit your way through an application,” Villanueva said. “You’re an adult when you come to college, and you should be responsible for what you put on the Internet.”
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