From the 9^th grade, high school students are taught to start planning their futures. We are told to select courses that interest us and that we believe we will be successful in, but are also encouraged to research the prerequisites required for the university programs we are striving for; all established at the young age of 15. By 17 years of age, students must apply for programs at universities of our choice that will determine our career paths, future, and life.

At 15 years old I found myself overwhelmed with options. At 16 years old I found myself confused with what area of study I wanted to pursue. At 17 years old I found myself both terribly overwhelmed and utterly confused with choices. High school was stressful. However, by 3:30 pm every day after school, I found time for some entertainment. I turned on my computer and launched the internet to my homepage: Facebook.

Facebook and other social media forms such as Twitter are essential to high school students. They are places to splurge emotions, slander our peers, and try to make ourselves appear 10 times better looking and more popular. The most important aspect of social media to high school students though is that they are free access into other people’s lives. They are a way to “creep” (as the Facebook-savvy call it) and a way to find things out about a person you would have never known otherwise.

“Creeping” also happens to be a favorite tool of post-secondary schools and companies. Thousands upon thousands of applications are sent to universities every fall. Thousands upon thousands of students currently use Facebook. So why not enter a few names and click a few buttons to find out what kind of students plan to attend your school? Post-secondary schools are doing exactly this. They have started to conduct background checks on students applying to their schools via social networking sites.

For those not involved in the social media world, creeping is not an issue. However for those of us who like to show and tell the world of our life stories, this may be detrimental. Allowing your superiors to have the ability to critique your life may damage your chances of getting accepted into your university program which may ruin your career path, future, and life that you have been planning since you were 15. That may be a big stretch but the point’s there.

So what’s a student to do? I know many who have deleted their Facebook or Twitter entirely. Others have simply changed their last names or created fake names altogether.

Social media is a huge part of a high school student’s life. It is a way to show off to friends, release some steam, and connect with our peers. But there is public access to these sites and they are a prime source for people to do their research on a person’s life and lifestyle.

Students- as much as you love telling your 3, 000 friends the schedule of last weekend and uploading 95 pictures to go with it- beware of the new age magnifying glass. It’s called the social networking background check.