It may well be. Kaplan released a report last week in which a survey of 320 college admissions officers showed that about 10% of them look at the social networking sites of high school seniors who've applied to their college. The news is not good...

In 38% of the cases where an admission officer looked at an applicants Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, or some similar page it had a negative impact on the student's application. In 37% of the cases it had no impact. And in only 25% of the cases the student's social networking page had a positive impact on the application process.

The percentage of admissions officers who look at an applicant's social networking site goes up for professional schools. About 14% of law school admissions offices and 15% of medical school admissions officers look at social netowrking sites that their applicants have online, according to Kaplan.


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The federal Pell Grant program is staring into the face of a huge shortfall for the 2008-09 academic year, according to the NY Times. The grant program that provides assistance for college on the basis of economic need could see a short fall of as much as $6 billion for the academic year just now starting.

A number of factors have come together to create the problem. The Chronicle of Higher Education points to the increased size of the Pell Grant as one factor contributing to the short fall.


© Tracy O

Duke University is introducing an ambitious new model for its global MBA program, according to Business Week. The new model will have students moving between campuses in Shanghai, Dubai, London, St. Petersburg in Russia, Johannesburg, and New Delhi in a fairly radical reworking of the global MBA concept.

The program is described more fully in a statement released by Duke.

"With the simultaneous launch of our new international locations, Fuqua will be the first truly global business school, shaped and driven by the fundamental issues of our time," said Blair Sheppard, dean of Duke's Fuqua School of Business. "The depth of our activities in each location ensures we will become truly embedded in each region. By engaging with these regions through education and research, we will be able to examine the world's opportunities and problems, explore interdependencies between regions, create solutions to address world issues, and prepare practitioners to be change agents and informed leaders."


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"Although coed dorms can be fun, they also can be hotbeds of sexual harassment."

Naomi Rockler-Gladen has a gift for understatement...

In a recent piece at Suite101, Naomi talks about how to recognize sexual harassment. While catcalls and sexual propositions are easy to recognize as sexual harassment, dorm residents need to understand that conversations that make you uncomfortable can also constitute sexual harassment once you've asked that a topic be avoided around you.

Naomi goes into some detail in explaining how to identify sexual harassment After all, you can't report it if you can't identify it. And sexual harassment is, well, illegal. Her article is worth reading. You can read the whole article here.


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OMG. Talk about radical...

University Business has a post today about how the chancellor of Pennsylvania's 14 state-owned universities "has stepped beyond the state's new indoor smoking ban and barred students, employees and visitors from lighting up anywhere on campus-even outdoors."

Everyone in the state seems either really happy or super pissed.

An AP report says that the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees plans to fight the ban. They represent about 2,500 maintenance, dining hall, skilled labor and clerical workers.

The Chronicle of Higher Education's blog had reports on some of the rather emotional reactions to the new rule...


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My certification as a teacher includes learning disabilities and I've written about the topic occasionally on my education blog, The Green Cup, and at Suite 101. So when I saw Aaron Smiths piece, Helpful Hints for Students with Learning Disabilities, I was interested...

Smith gives some good advice: "The biggest piece of advice that I can give an LD student is to be a strong self-advocate. Know your strengths and weaknesses and feel comfortable self-disclosing this information to an Admissions Counselor during a college interview."

You can read the whole blog post here.


© Tostie14