What determines whether or not you qualify for enrollment at any given college should simply be a matter of your preceding grades and merit versus others for limited space. It’s how who’s accepted and who isn’t at universities for decades. But now that we are in the age of the search engine, where your name may or may not exist in cyberspace, admissions workers can conceivably perform their own outside research on you. What your name is attached to when someone searches it on Google has the potential to seriously undermine your effort to get into the college of your choice.
Ideally, when an admissions office employee Google searches your name, things that promote your eligibility for enrollment are what pop up. Mentions of awards on your hometown news website, a blog or two about interesting and relative topics, and a respectable looking Facebook profile can all contribute to you getting into a good school. It’s important to think about this aspect before applying. You might want to talk to your high school about possibly posting something that mentions something you did on their website, or round up a body of journals you can convert to a blog sans the private details. In case an admissions office or employee has a policy about researching prospective students in the Internet, you want to have results that shine.
You might have a problem, however, if instead of accolades, an admissions office uncovers negative information about you when performing a Google search. Such “bad” press has become such a common problem for individuals and entities that operate via the Internet that reputation management has sprung up as a viable online business. While such a drastic and relatively pricey step might be outside the range of possibility of the potential college student, you should definitely be considering what to do in the event that a Google search of your name turns up bad information. Maybe an ex went on a rant about you somewhere, or maybe a Facebook photo album shows you taking full advantage of kegger when it’s clear you’re not 21 yet. If you can get these things removed off the web yourself, definitely do so. If not, consider getting outside help if what Google shows you is something a school would reasonably reject an applicant for.
The best way to avoid having to worry about an admissions office doing a Google background check on you is to never allow negative or otherwise racy and potentially offensive content online associated with you to exist. It’s not always possible, especially in a world where others have the potential to post such things instead of you. But if you are always wary of the potential harm online activity can do to your reputation even before you take your first college course, you should develop an instinct that will properly safeguard you against such an event from occurring.
