Colleges Turn to New Media to Recruit Students

If MySpace and Facebook are where the high school kids are, then that’s where college recruiters are headed. Schools competing for today’s tech-savvy teens are reaching out to them through podcasts, online videos, virtual campus tours, live chats, blogs, and social networking profiles, reports the Boston Globe—and those stuffy old admissions officers are increasingly in touch with prospectives via IM and text.

"This is how they prefer to communicate, and it gives us a chance to build a relationship with them," says one admissions director. "Technology is changing the admissions landscape very quickly." An increasing number of students who find colleges online, plus declining response rates for direct mailings, have driven the change. "Students find us on the Internet," said another admissions officer. (More college admissions stories.)