<p>So I applied for Emory Scholars. A few days before my app was due, my counselor (who manages EVERY student in my 500-ish student school) showed me the letter of nomination he would be sending. </p>
<p>It. Was. Awful.</p>
<p>Basically he copy/pasted things directly from my resume (without bothering to sync the font with the font of the body of the letter!). And just made simple-sentence staments about me </p>
<p>Example:
"She is a hard worker."</p>
<p>As I was reading the letter he said "You'll have to bear with me, I'm not a writer..." and I was like "Yeah...I actually want them to realize that I'm smart."</p>
<p>And THEN he said...</p>
<p>"Well, your SAT scores aren't really competitive for this scholarship, so I tried to highlight your bubbly personality and work ethic." (He didn't)</p>
<p>I guess he thought I was crazy for believing I could win Emory Scholars with a knockout essay, killer ECs, and a near-spotless GPA with a rigorous secondary school record. I ALREADY knew my SAT scores sucked, but isn't it HIS job to tell me I can still succeed?</p>
<p>Yeah. So basically my essay and his letter were my only shot at convincing Emory to award me admission/Emory Scholars. </p>
<p>Anyway, my point is, how can I prevent this from happening again? He has to write my Common App Counselor report with a supplementary letter. I don't want him keeping me out of college.</p>
<p>Most counselors are busy.
So my advice is..
Ask him if you can write it yourself; because you know yourself better than anyone else.
And if he says yes, do it, then show it to him, if he agrees with everything you said, he'll sign it.
GOT IT? =]
good luck!</p>
<p>There is nothing you can do immediately for yourself. You have to face the fact that he is your counselor, and you have to work with him. You can help him though. Give him some suggestions for your letters, and remind him of some specifics about you. In the long term, write to your school board, or senator. Better yet, everyone! Schedule an appointment or arrange to meet quickly with your principal, and show him/her the letter of recommendation. If your school has any conscience, he should be fired if he doesn't improve the next year, at the most.</p>
<p>This is what a public school education is like most of the time. The mentality there is "who gives a damn about college. All that matters is our standardized test scores to get more money!"</p>
<p>Another comment I should make about him is that his main purpose seems to be keeping "at-risk" kids IN school.</p>
<p>Only about 15-20% of the senior classes at my HS even apply to college. So it's obvious that he's not used to students like myself who are applying to 10ish schools.</p>
<p>But THAT in itself is wrong. To give preference to helping students stay in school who might mess up their enrollment numbers opposed to helping college-bound students get into college.</p>
<p>hahaha.
regarding teh letter.
if he signs it and you wrote it.
and he agrees with everything you said.
basically its his recommendation.
they would call him and ask.
and if he's smart he'll pull up your file
while he's talkin to them.
you know?</p>
<p>^^
Precisely Joli. The problem in public schools is that college acceptances don't matter in a school's reputation or how much state funding it gets. All that matters are standardized test scores and graduation rates, so this counselor focuses on the latter.</p>
<p>One counselor for 500 students is ridiculous. I live close by one of the largest public schools in the nation. (it has 5500 students total) If you only count the senior class, each of their six counselors is responsible for about 220 seniors. However, total each counselor manages about 700 students. 9th grade has their own counselor there.</p>
<p>As would be expected, my private school has three counselors for a senior class of 300, and a total 10-12 grade size of about 900. 9th grade again has their own counselor. This means each counselor is responsible for a total of about 300 students, and even then it is mostly the seniors that go to them, and occasionally the juniors.</p>
<p>Not only is the lack of counselors unacceptable, but the fact that he writes like a student in grade school is horrible.</p>
<p>And I wish there was a way to put a red flag on my applications that read "SMALL, RURAL HICKTOWN COMMUNITY"</p>
<p>But alas, I get compared to suburban schools, private schools, and even inter-city schools which are much better.</p>
<p>My school is very very poor, but for some reason we have a lot of unnecessary staff. FOR example...</p>
<p>There's this random lady who works in the counseling office. She can't do ANYTHING. I asked her to send a transcript for me, and it took her about 3 hours to figure it out. No joke.</p>
<p>I complained about her and someone said she was placed in the counseling office because she used to be a bus driver and they couldn't fire her/lay her off for some reason?</p>
<p>Who's your congressman? I may sound like a cheesy public service announcement, but you should e-mail them. They won't be able to do anything directly, but can intervene in local affairs and have more influence more than other local politicians. Being a senior eligible to vote in 2008, arguably the most important recent election, can also give you a great amount of influence and their support. There is a website you can do it from. Write</a> Your Representative - Contact your Congressperson in the U.S. House of Representatives.</p>
<p>its unethical to write it yourself and just get them to sign it, i think colleges take rec's with a grain of salt. sure its important but a rec isn't your work, it is someone else's. i've had some pretty generic, crappy recs in the past, and there is not much you can do about it.</p>
<p>But what I could consider is writing a rough-draft for him. Something to go by so he's not completely reliant on his own (lack of) writing skills. </p>
<p>My amazing English teacher is writing most of my rec's though. Thank gosh USC allows EITHER a counselor or teacher to fill out their form. I ripped that rec from my counselors hands faster than he could write "She does good work."</p>
<p>"And I wish there was a way to put a red flag on my applications that read "SMALL, RURAL HICKTOWN COMMUNITY""</p>
<p>There probably already is; your hs profile will be included with your transcript. It should be pretty obvious that your GC doesn't have the resources he should. If you can get decent teacher rec's they will more than trump the GC masterpiece. </p>
<p>"But alas, I get compared to suburban schools, private schools, and even inter-city schools which are much better."</p>
<p>If you have a reasonable list of schools, I think you will do well. Although admissions is pretty byzantine, I do believe that most college admissions officers do their best to look for strong students who have made the most of their opportunities. Besides, 'she does good work' beats 'she tries really hard.'</p>
<p>I had the same problem with summer ecs i was applying to...</p>
<p>but this was a topic on a diff thread, and As long as its not horrible its ok if it sounds generic. Colleges know big public schools have counselors that arent going to have the time to deal with and personally get to know all of their students if they have 500+, so they dont put so much weight on conselor recs(or so I hear). They basically just want one so they know there is nothing else they would need to know about you that they couldnt from a resume that your counselor would know, i.e. if you had trouble with the cops or something</p>
<p>A good and useful tip:
bribe him with some modest gifts. Employ some adulation and flattery. Also, I'd recommend maybe sending a chocolate bar (or some other kind of inexpensive, but good food) so that he remembers you and actually funnels his efforts for your sake.</p>
<p>I'm not sure if there was any confusion or not, but he's the counselor for my SMALL high school consisting of 500+ kids. My senior class is not 500+.</p>
<p>However, he manages EVERYONE, all grades. So yeah. Clarification.</p>
<p>And I'm not so sure about the gift, I feel like he owes ME. Bitterrrr.</p>