4 Foolproof Ways to Protect Your Reputation on Social Media

We’ve all heard it by now: the Internet is forever. A bad social media presence can follow anyone of any demographic down the road. Think of how many times you’ve heard on the news that a teen was expelled, cyberbullied, or rejected from colleges based on one digital mistake. Countless adults have been fired from jobs and penalized by the law based on poor social media choices.

The beginning of a new school year is as good a time as any to make sure that you and your kids are in control of your digital reputations. Use these tips to ensure that you are maintaining reputable social media accounts:

1. Be selective about who you're friends with on social media.

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Facebook and the College Admission Process

Have you and your kids talked about how their social networks will impact the college application process? Nowadays, college admissions officials routinely review applicants’ social network pages.

 

It is important for your teen to consider their Facebook page as one of the components of their college application, just like the SATs, the academic recommendations and the application essay. Your son or daughter’s Facebook page tells a very important part of their story.

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They Loved Your G.P.A.,Then They Saw Your Tweets

The following is a great article from the New York Times about social media and the impact it can have on your child's academic future. If you are interested in this topic, please join us for a Twitter party at 1pm EDT today to discuss this important issue. Learn more here.

At Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Me., admissions officers are still talking about the high school senior who attended a campus information session last year for prospective students. Throughout the presentation, she apparently posted disparaging tweets about her fellow attendees, repeatedly using a common expletive.

Perhaps she hadn’t realized that colleges keep track of their social media mentions.

“It was incredibly unusual and foolish of her to do that,” Scott A. Meiklejohn, Bowdoin’s dean of admissions and financial aid, told me last week. The college ultimately denied the student admission, he said, because her academic record wasn’t competitive. But had her credentials been better, those indiscreet posts could have scuttled her chances.

“We would have wondered about the judgment of someone who spends their time on their mobile phone and makes such awful remarks,” Mr. Meiklejohn said.

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Your Teen’s Online Reputation: Keep It Positive. Keep It Safe

Online reputation is everything to teens, especially when their social lives exist almost entirely online. Much of what teens do and say online is guided by their need for acceptance among their classmates and other peers.  But with the ever-changing nature of the Internet, what happens when a teen’s reputation gets away from them and seems to take on a life of its’ own?

Without proper management, just a few simple mistakes posted online could follow your teen years down the road, and even affect potential employment opportunities.  While there are many things you and your teen can do to keep their online name in good standing, here are the top three things we think are important:

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We are pleased to announce that Bark will be taking over where we leave off. The uKnowKids mission to protect digital kids will live on with Bark. Our team will be working closely with Bark’s team in the future, so that we can continue making the digital world a safer, better place for kids and their families. While we are disappointed we could not complete this mission independently, we are also pleased to hand the uKnowKids baton to Bark.
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