Creighton Uses Text Messages
To Tell Students They’re Accepted
OMAHA, Neb.
Incoming Creighton University students aren’t awaiting the mail each day to find out if they’ve been accepted. Now, they’re looking at their cell phones.
Since November, 700 students — or 44 percent — of those admitted to Creighton have been notified through a text message on their cell phones.
The school added a box on application forms last fall, allowing students to be alerted in one of the most popular ways for younger people to communicate — via text messaging.
The university is trying to respond to the needs of its students, says Mary Chase, director of admissions and scholarships at Creighton.
“Students are so interested in having instant information,” she says.
Opting for the text message allows students to know the university’s decision up to a week earlier. She said text messages are sent to students within 24 hours of the admission committee’s decision, whereas letters can take several days to draft and then arrive in the mail.
Creighton is considered among the first schools in the country to use text message technology in this way.
Katie Infantine, 17, says she couldn’t believe it when she saw a text message flash on her screen.
“Katie, congratulations. You’ve been admitted to Creighton,” it read.
She says she ran to her family members and showed them her message. None of her friends had heard of any college notifying their students in this way, she says.
“Text messaging is really popular with my friends,” Infantine says. “So the fact a college would do that is really cool.”
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