Spring Break
Some schools look to Facebook, MySpace
Janhavi Purohit
Issue date: 9/26/08 Section: News
Kaplan's annual survey of college admissions officers showed a new trend this year in the admissions process being used in schools across the country - some graduate schools are now looking at the social networking pages of prospective students as part of their admissions decision process.
Glen Stohr, director of pre-law programs at Kaplan, said the surveys are done annually with undergraduate admissions officers as well as with officers at law schools, medical schools and business schools, among other graduate programs.
According to Stohr, the graduate schools with the largest number of admissions officers looking at students' networking pages are law schools - almost 15 percent of the law schools surveyed said they had admissions officers who, at one point, had personally visited a student's social networking site.
"The reason I think you see the highest percentage with law schools is two-fold. One, law schools, unlike business and medical schools, almost never do face to face interviews, so when you want to know more about who the person is, you look at their social networking page," Stohr said. "The flipside of that is that law schools are very aware of how rigorously bar associations will scrutinize your character and fitness."
According to Stohr, many schools are still developing their policies and guidelines on using social networking pages as part of admissions decisions.
"I will tell you right now, social networking has grown so much and participated in so much, so quickly, that this is like the Wild, Wild West for admissions officers," Stohr said. "They're trying to figure out what to do and what not to do. Seventeen percent of law schools said they are formulating a policy now."
Stohr added that it is difficult to determine what shape these policies will take.
Drexel University's office of enrollment considered this process as well at one point, though, according to Erin Finn, assistant vice president for admissions, the idea was "quickly dismissed."
Glen Stohr, director of pre-law programs at Kaplan, said the surveys are done annually with undergraduate admissions officers as well as with officers at law schools, medical schools and business schools, among other graduate programs.
According to Stohr, the graduate schools with the largest number of admissions officers looking at students' networking pages are law schools - almost 15 percent of the law schools surveyed said they had admissions officers who, at one point, had personally visited a student's social networking site.
"The reason I think you see the highest percentage with law schools is two-fold. One, law schools, unlike business and medical schools, almost never do face to face interviews, so when you want to know more about who the person is, you look at their social networking page," Stohr said. "The flipside of that is that law schools are very aware of how rigorously bar associations will scrutinize your character and fitness."
According to Stohr, many schools are still developing their policies and guidelines on using social networking pages as part of admissions decisions.
"I will tell you right now, social networking has grown so much and participated in so much, so quickly, that this is like the Wild, Wild West for admissions officers," Stohr said. "They're trying to figure out what to do and what not to do. Seventeen percent of law schools said they are formulating a policy now."
Stohr added that it is difficult to determine what shape these policies will take.
Drexel University's office of enrollment considered this process as well at one point, though, according to Erin Finn, assistant vice president for admissions, the idea was "quickly dismissed."
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