It’s most likely no shock that universities are looking through available data on applicants to analyze and target their potential students, but it may surprise you to find out just how much these higher education institutions know about us.

Due to the continual influx of college applications, universities are attempting to find new methods to narrow down their applicant pool. This is done by placing a heavier preference on “demonstrated interest.” Increasingly, universities are accounting for students’ interactions with the school during the application process before admitting or denying them.

Throughout this process, colleges know down to the second when students open emails from the school and if they clicked on any of the links in the email. They can also figure out how long a student spends on their website, as well as if you RSVP for an event and don’t show up.

Let’s take a moment and look at Seton Hall University in N.J. According to a Wall Street Journal article that delved into data mining at the university level, Seton Hall has a scoring system from one to 100. Unbeknownst to the students, Seton gives each person a score on that scale to represent their demonstrated interest. There are roughly 80 variables that go into the scoring process. Beyond the variables mentioned earlier, Seton looks at how early in your high school career that you began looking at their website, too. 

Oftentimes, upon researching a potential college, demonstrated interest is listed as a significant factor. It is frequently rated by the schools as important or somewhat important, depending upon the institution. Now, it is turning into an “unspoken requirement” just as extracurriculars and supplemental essays are. Ranked amongst the most important factors in college admission processes from various institutions, it lands at number seven, just below essays and the counselor recommendation. It’s worth acknowledging that universities typically place importance upon demonstrated interest when considering a borderline applicant whose decision could go either way.

Now that you’re unnerved, we can begin to perceive data mining in a few ways. It’s most beneficial to view this in a positive light. Due to advanced information technology and data scrounging methodologies, universities can form a better idea of the applicant pool they want to target. With a clearer target market, it increases the likelihood that the university that gets in touch with you is one in which you’re interested. Plus, the bulk of demonstrated interest is online, as seen through time spent on their website, whether a link is clicked or not and number of emails opened—it’s understandable if you can’t make a campus tour, especially if the university is a flight away. In that way, data mining makes it easier to demonstrate interest and stand out.

Understandably so, some people may be wary of being micro-analyzed. Yet, what most people don’t acknowledge is that we’re already being analyzed in all aspects of our lives.

Putting it into a realistic context, these privacy concerns are merely concerns. Most millennials and Gen Zers have grown up with their personal information at the hands of corporations and higher education institutions. Unfortunately, it has been ongoing throughout the past couple of decades. We shouldn’t fear it; rather, it’s best that we confront it and use it to our advantage.