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Today’s high school students spend a lot of time online. Whether they are socializing on the many social networks such as myspace.com or xanga, or conducting research for their homework, teens are internet savvy. To capitalize on students’ connectedness, many colleges and universities are now recruiting their future student bodies online.

Blogs are one of the leading web-based recruitment tools used by colleges and universities. Students can log on to read about the day-to-day activities of current students, or get a behind-the-scenese peak at the school. The school’s web site is also a valuable for providing prospective students information about the school.

College sites now rank higher than high school visits from campus representatives and direct mailings in importance as recruitment strategies, said Steve Kappler, an executive director of Stamats Inc., a Cedar Rapids, Iowa, firm that providees consulting services to about 100 colleges and universities a year.

With the increase in web-based recruitment, such as blogs, schools struggle with the messages they choose to communicate. Should the content be edited, or should blogs be the words of the students?

“We wanted them to be authentic,” Nacy Prater, Web content coordinator at Ball State University told ABC News. “If we got too involved in as marketing experts in editing their words, it wouldn’t sound right at all. You can’t get into that mode when you aren’t a student.”

Regardless of the way colleges and universities approach online recruiting, the point is that it is a growing trend. Your high school students will conduct the majority of their college searches entirely online. The better you understand this trend, the more you’ll be able to help your high school students.