Lying on Your College Application

Lying on your college application is an incredibly bad idea. Whether your lies are about winning some prestigious award or about how many hours per week you spend doing an activity, these lies on your college application can and very well may catch up to you. You may think that college admissions officers won’t notice a lie here or there but why on earth would you take such a risk? The smallest of lies will derail your candidacy for admission to the college of your dreams. Do you really want that to happen? We didn’t think so.

Lying on your college application can lead to the revocation of your admission (photo credit: Jessica Williams).

As you’ll note on the Harvard University admissions website, a misrepresentation of credentials is absolutely unacceptable. Just because the office of admissions may not have caught onto your lies when they admitted you, you should also know that this doesn’t mean they won’t find out about your lies thereafter. That’s right — you can get kicked out of Harvard during your senior year because you misrepresented your credentials on your application to the school. All of that work down the drain!

Don’t think we’re serious? Read it straight from Harvard’s admissions website yourself: “Occasionally, a candidate for admission will make inaccurate statements or submit false material in connection with his or her application. In most cases, these misrepresentations are discovered during the admission process and the application is rejected. If a misrepresentation is discovered after a candidate has been admitted, the offer of admission will be withdrawn. If a misrepresentation is discovered after a student has registered, the offer of admission normally will be revoked and the student will be required to leave the College. If the discovery occurs after a degree has been awarded, the degree will be rescinded. The determination that an application contains misrepresentations or inaccuracies rests solely with the Admissions Office and will be resolved outside the student disciplinary process.”

Don’t take the risk. Lying on your college app is not worth it. Always be honest. In college admissions and in life. It will serve you well!