Incoming college students are hearing the usual warnings this summer about the dangers of everything from alcohol to credit card debt. But many are also getting lectured on a new topic — the risks of Internet postings, particularly on popular social networking sites such as Facebook.
Colleges around the country have revamped their orientation talks to students and parents to include online behavior. Susquehanna University and Washington University in St. Louis, for example, have new role-playing skits on the topic that students will watch and then break into smaller groups to discuss.
Facebook, geared toward college students and boasting 7.5 million registered users, is a particular focus. But students are also hearing stories about those who came to regret postings to other online venues, from party photos on sites such as Webshots.com to comments about professors in blogs.
“The particular focus is the public nature of this,” says Tracy Tyree, Susquehanna’s dean of student life. “That seems to be what surprises students most. They think of it as part of their own little world, not a bigger electronic world.”
The attention colleges are devoting to the topic is testimony both to the exploding popularity of online networking on campus, and to the time and energy administrators have spent dealing with the fallout when students post things that become more public than they intended.
Northwestern University temporarily suspended its women’s soccer program last spring after hazing photos surfaced online, while athletes at Elon College, Catholic University, Wake Forest University and the University of Iowa were also disciplined or investigated. At least one school, Kent State University, banned athletes from using Facebook.com. Coaches at other schools have reportedly done the same.
Non-athletes at numerous schools have been busted for alcohol violations based on uploaded digital photographs. Students at Pennsylvania State University were punished for rushing the field at a football game. A University of Oklahoma freshman’s joke in Facebook about assassinating President Bush prompted a visit from the Secret Service.
