<p>This question is directed to those who have two last names without an hyphen. How is your name in high school? Let’s say you name is John smith brown and no middle name.</p>
<p>The system in my school weren’t allowed to put a space between the two last names so they put a hyphen making it John Smith-Brown. I always use John Smith for everything, even my social says John Smith. </p>
<p>The school says they have to follow what’s on my birth certificate, which is John Smith Brown, and the best they could do was a hyphen in between. But in the U.S only the dad’s last name is used, thats why i have my social with one last name.</p>
<p>After years talking to the office lady, she said she could change it to John Smith if i wanted to, now im not sure. What do you guys do?</p>
<p>Alright, so I have a last name that has a space in it, but it isn’t always western-recognizable (which is funny, cause it’s Spanish, and you’d think people would be able to recognize that). Instead of being hyphenated, a lot of documents end up combining them into one last name. A lot of spam mail end up dropping the first half altogether (or using it as my middle name, even though I have a recognizable, distinct middle name). So yeah.</p>
<p>My school didn’t have a problem with it though. I mean, it’s most likely just due to poor programming or logistical methods that they can’t document two last names, but whatever your birth certificate says is your legal name so even if your school does document you with a hyphenated name, it won’t really matter (as you’d probably be identified via SSN either way). So yeah, hyphenating your name on your school docs shouldn’t be a problem.</p>