According to The Hechinger Report, when Ithaca College was looking at applicants for this year’s freshman class, they considered how many friends and photos their applicants had on social media. You might be asking yourself why colleges care, but here’s the reason: Colleges believe that by using these types of factors, which they call “big data,” they are able to identify which students are most likely to succeed and eventually graduate from their institution.

Eric Maguire, the current Vice President and Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid at Franklin & Marshall College, told The Hechinger Report that using this data as part of the selection process has already boosted the number of students who decide to stay after their freshman year. Colleges and universities are likely to continue to use new types of data and analysis to help with their decisions, especially since schools face an added pressure from outside companies such as bond rating agencies who decide how much money a college or university will have to pay in interest that year. Those agencies make their decisions based on the ratio of number of students who are accepted versus the number of students that actually decide to attend the school. The higher the ratio, the higher the demand the schools have. Each school has their own system of determining which students will actually attend if accepted.

Kelly Meehan, a rising sophomore music major at Ithaca from Saratoga Springs, New York gave her opinion about the data collected on her: “I really didn’t think about how the school might use that information, but I guess I was already through enough of the college admissions process that I felt like all of my information was already with the schools.”

While it doesn't come as news that schools and jobs check out your online profiles, it's a little crazy to think that how many "friends" we have can determine our future success. Ultimately, though, it's important to remember that each facet of your application just tells one part of your story, and that colleges want to see the full picture and get to know the authentic you.

What do you think about colleges checking out your Facebook and social media profiles and including this "big data" in their admissions decisions?

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