Hi,
I have applied REA at Stanford. I have a letter of rec from one Stanford Professor and an email note from another Stanford Professor sent to the Admissions team. Besides, I have 2 letters of rec from my high school teachers and a letter from my school counselor.
In addition, an executive (doesn’t work for Stanford) who knows me well has offered to send a support letter to someone he knows on the admissions team. This executive’s both kids went to Stanford.
Should I say yes to this outside letter? I am wondering if it is too many letters. Each letter does bring a different angle about me.
Too many. AOs have somewhere between seven and eight minutes to read and make an assessment of everything in your profile. They are not going to read six LoRs because they do not have time. Unless you did pertinent-to-your-major work for this executive directly, his reference is a waste of their time, if they even bother reading it. It ranks well below your other LoRs, of which you already have rather a lot… except the email. What did the email say, and did the author give you permission to include it as part of your application?
You have too many letters. How many does Stanford want? How many and what types do they want from teachers who have had you in their classes? If all Stanford requests is two teachers and the counselor recommendation, don’t send anything else.
Does this “executive” have experience working with you? If not…delete. What about the Stanford professors? Have you studied or worked with them?
An extra letter or two can be appropriate in certain contexts. For instance, an arts supplement or significant EC that shows a side of you that is not on the application. Why are those Stanford professors writing for you? Did you do work for them? Absolute no on the executive.
Just check to see if the college even will accept additional information. Even arts supplements are not accepted everywhere as @compmom knows. Some schools are very clear on which recommendations they expect to see…and whether they will even look at anything additional. Some won’t even look at additional items submitted.
And agree again…unless you have worked for or taken classes from the Stanford professors, why are they writing you a reference?
And some schools that don’t take supplements may still take one or two extra letters if warranted, appropriate and limited to those one or two. The best thing is to call admissions and ask. And try not to talk to a student answering
Stanford requires two letters of rec (in addition to the counselor letter). They also say they will take up to one additional LoR. So I strongly discourage you from sending anything beyond one additional LoR, or email, or note, or however you want to characterize it.
Letters of recommendation from two teachers are required. We recommend requesting letters from grade 11 or 12 teachers in English, math, science, foreign language, or history/social studies. You may request a letter from a grade 10 teacher if the coursework was advanced (e.g., Honors, AP, IB). Letters from classroom teachers are strongly preferred.
You may submit one optional letter if there is another person who knows you well and can provide new insights about you. Please assign this person as your “Other Recommender” in the Common Application, and add a “General Recommendation” in the Coalition Application. This is the fastest method for a letter to reach your file.
One way to get additional feedback to colleges is to see if your counselor will accept “in-house” recommendations. These are recommendation letters sent to the counselor, who then incorporates key points from those letters into her letter. Our high school counselor accepted them.
I did work for one of the Stanford Professors who has given a letter of rec. I have known and met the other Stanford Prof who has written an email note to admissions team but I didn’t do any work under him.
This executive has seen my work in my topmost extra-curricular activity, so he knows me really well and can add additional flavor to my application package.
With this background, does your recommendation change? Thanks again!
No. If Stanford wanted 3 optional recs, they would allow three optional recs. But they don’t; they allow one.
As noted earlier, each application gets allotted a maximum amount of time to be read. The time spent reading additional recs is time not spent reflecting on other parts of of your application.
There is an old adage: the thicker the file, the thicker the kid. Which would seem to have a bit of accuracy when the kid opts to disregard directions.
I definitely know instances where two letters were accepted, when only one was allowed, but after a call to admissions.
The letter concerning your important EC might have been accepted and might have been helpful.
The problem is, you already have two. I would have omitted the email from the prof. who has met you but doesn’t know you well. I think three is too many.
Nevertheless, you can contact admissions and ask them if you really want the other letter. @skieurope is of course right about overdoing these things.
