Few PSE institutions check applicants' social media posts

While social media becomes increasingly more popular with students, a new Kaplan study reveals that fewer than 1 in 3 admissions officers in the US say they check students' social media postings or Google results when evaluating applications. However, that number is up from 1 in 5 in 2011. “That’s their private space,” says Richard Shaw, Dean of Admissions at Stanford University. “Imagine if we could remove ourselves to an age when people wrote wonderful letters back and forth. We wouldn't be searching through that. So I think it's wrong to do just because it's there." Admissions officers also say there are just too many applicants to Google each of them, and that Googling just a sample would be wrong. Last year, California passed a law prohibiting colleges from requiring students to provide social media information. SF Gate