Unintended Impressions

What’s in a name? More than you might think! Here’s a scenario: A student wants more information on their dream school. They send the admissions office an email asking for more information about the nursing program. Now, this is the first impression that someone at that school will get of this student. What do you think that impression might be if their email is something like “partygirl757” or “alwayslate_818”? Consider the email address you created as a kid and think, Does this portray me as a young professional that’s college-ready?

Save yourself from making this mistake by creating a college email address. Keep it simple with your first and last name or some variation (first initial, last name; first name last initial). This allows you to come off professional and keep all of your college correspondence in one place.

Have a whacky voicemail message too? You might want to rethink that as well.

What other ways can you make an impression? Social media. If one picture is worth a thousand words, you might want to be cautious about what you post. Consider cleaning up your social media before the college application process. Don’t feel that you have to create a fake persona or anything like that—be your authentic self! One way to avoid making unintended impressions with social media is to make your accounts private or by updating your privacy settings.

Try to Google search yourself! See what pops up. Remove inactive social media accounts and review permissions of your apps and accounts to see what you’re allowing them to post.

And don’t forget the common-sense rules that apply to any kind of online communication. Be wary of sharing any personal contact information online.