Numbers no longer have the same appeal for admissions officers at the University of Tennessee. They’re moving away from the SAT, ACT and grade-point average in favor of a more complete view of their prospective students, according to reporter Joan Garrett.

It’s a familiar goal among the nation’s colleges — go beyond test scores and other statistics to get a fuller picture of a prospect to help determine if he or she will be a best-fit student. Increasingly, Facebook and other social networks are serving as allies in the search.

The number of admissions offices using Facebook to learn more about an applicant has quadrupled in the past year, reports Garrett of the Chattanooga Times Free Press. While schools are sensitive to the perception that they are invading students’ privacy, there is a growing sense that using Facebook to double-check the validity of a claim or to find out more about a scholarship applicant is a valuable — and acceptable — exercise.

Garrett relates a story about a student who bragged online that his interview went well and then called the institution his second-choice “safety school.” That did not sit well with the staff and he was denied admission. It’s opportunities like this to learn more about what students are really thinking that can be most helpful, not the snooping into private lives that some people fear.

And now those opportunities to track what students really think is easier than ever, says Campus Technology magazine. “TargetX…has integrated Facebook and Twitter into its Student Recruitment Manager (SRM) as a way for institutions to get a better, more authentic picture of their prospects.”

The magazine quotes CEO Brian Niles advising institutions to pay attention to what students are posting on social media sites. “What students say on social networks offers the most complete and authentic picture of their interests, concerns, goals — perhaps even the likelihood that they will or won’t enroll in your school.”

Sounds just like what the University of Tennessee has in mind.

Read “Colleges Use Facebook to Evaluate Prospective Students” by Joan Garrett.

Read “TargetX Tool Enables Colleges To Track Social Chatter For Recruitment” by Kanoe Namahoe.

Read more about our authors.  Ray Ulmer, public relations director at TargetX, has been involved in higher education marketing for more than 25 years, including serving as executive director of communications at La Salle University and director of public relations at Drexel University. He has also worked in corporate marketing and advertising.