<p>Along with the two teacher recommendations, is there a limit to how many supplemental recommendations you should have? I know there is no technical "limit," but what I mean is, is there a point where too many supp. recs can hurt your application?</p>
<p>I didn't really get a chance on my application (short essays) to elaborate about my commitment in debate. My debate coach wrote a recommendation, which I read. The rec pretty much covers what I would have said and more, and was very good, albeit only about 2-3 pages (although it's the first recommendation I've read, so I don't know if this it he usual length or not).</p>
<p>On my application, I did go in more about swimming, which is a much bigger commitment for me. I've known my swim coach since I was 9 years old, and we've always been on good terms. I've seen him everyday for 2-3 hours, every week, every year since then, and I'm one of his best swimmers, too. He was a journalist in NY before becoming a head coach and creating his own team, so I feel like his recommendation would be very very good.</p>
<p>Is it bad if I submit both supplemental recommendations along with the two teacher recs? That would be a total of 4 recommendations, twice the number of required recommendations, and I have a feeling that seeing so many would just turn off the admissions.</p>
<p>Also, I was kind of asking this particularly for MIT (hence the post in this forum), but what do you guys think about other schools (notably Wharton and UChicago)?</p>
<p>Two supplemental recommendations is about the most I would recommend, but it’s not excessive. </p>
<p>There’s really not a hard-and-fast limit, and it’s up to you to decide whether you think additional recommendations will help your case. Bryan Nance, former admissions officer, memorably put it thus:
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<p>(The following is Mollie’s Grantsmanship Advice™ and should not be taken as the view of the admissions office or MIT or anybody else. :))</p>
<p>Ultimately, the choice about whether to send supplemental material shouldn’t be based on whether the admissions officers will be mad or annoyed (they won’t be; it’s their job to read the application you put together). It should be based on whether the additional material is helpful to your case, or whether it distracts the reader and detracts from your overall narrative.</p>
<p>The strongest application is the one that is exactly as concise as necessary. You are presenting an argument in your application: that you should be admitted to the freshman class at MIT. You want your argument to be as strong as possible, and that means not introducing extraneous material that doesn’t make sense within the narrative you’re framing.</p>