DaytonDailyNews.com

DAYTO — If you're a high school junior or senior, you're probably working hard to get into college — researching schools online, preparing applications, taking grueling SATs and ACTs and writing the perfect essay. Maybe you have an air-tight application.

But you could still blow it, with something you thought was harmless fun: Your online profile.

Whether it's through Friendster, Facebook, MySpace, Xanga or LiveJournal, you better have an air-tight online profile, too.

High school guidance counselors are warning juniors and seniors this year that their online profiles could make or break them in getting that "yes" answer from a college of choice.

Admissions directors are now checking out applicants online to weed out students amid increasing numbers of applications "and you cannot show a lack of responsibility," said Joan Place, director of guidance counseling at Centerville High School.

Most college admissions offices will say they look online for applicants only if something in a profile was brought to their attention.

But earlier this fall, a University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth study of 453 college admissions departments found that 26 percent of them are actively researching students through search engines such as Google and 21 percent are checking out social networking profiles when reviewing applicants.

It's a practice guidance counselors are hearing is getting more overt as they've talked with colleges this fall about qualities they're looking for in applicants, Place said.

"Every college has raised the bar on what they want from our students academically, and now it's socially, as well. What ends up separating you from another student could be how you present yourself online," she said.

The U-Mass study interviewed public and private universities around the country ranging from 50 to 50,000 students and with annual tuition ranging from $1,000 to $40,000.

The data showed that college admission officers' usage of social networks to background applicants is outpacing Fortune 500 companies who use online profiles to background potential employees.

That a college admissions officer could stumble across her Facebook account made Caroline Millard, a senior at Centerville High School, pretty uneasy.

"That's kind of scary," said Millard, who applied to a single school this year, Miami University in Oxford.

Not that Millard has to worry. She changed her privacy settings "a long time ago" and doesn't even put up her full last name so people can find her, she said. Millard credits her mom, Suzanne, for showing her magazine reports about Facebook spies and encouraging her to be careful.

But some of her other friends, she said, put up photos from parties and even their phone numbers.

"Nine times out of ten it's just innocence," Place said, about the potentially damaging material students put in their profiles. "High school students, who socially are living for today, just don't think their social and academic worlds mix."

How to fix your profile

Have an air-tight online profile for getting into college:

Safety first: Never post personal information such as your address, daily schedule, phone number, etc.

Make your profile private so that strangers can't look at your information, and be cautious about adding new friends who you do not personally know.

Pictures and references of you on your friends' pages can be damaging too. Ask them to take down photos on their profiles in which they've "tagged" you, along with comments.

SOURCE: National Association of College Admissions Counseling