<p>Please try to remember that the two requests you made of the GC, which were BOTH COMPLETELY VALID are not the main thing that goes in such a letter soliciting the recommendation. Yes, those were two thing worth bringing up that you hoped would be explained on the counselor report. The letter the student writes to each rec writer or GC is not simply asking him/her to explain this or that on their behalf. It is meant to highlight various strengths and points about themselves that they hope will be brought out in the rec. Yes, if something should be brought to adcoms’ attention, that could be included, but is not the main thrust of the letter the student is preparing. The letter is to help the rec writer craft an effective rec with anecdotes, samples, etc.</p>
<p>So nice to find a bunch of interesting, involved parents all navigating this process and offering helpful suggestions!</p>
<p>Calmom- I do agree that said that, like yours, my kids may have different amounts of success in college based on their independence and motivation in high school. </p>
<p>But as they apply, I hope to help my kids consider a variety of options, such as making good choices of appropriate colleges and programs (regardless of just the best numbers), and taking steps towards independence in high school (not necessarily just being dropped with no help during the application process).</p>
<p>If they can make sure they each find their passion that motivates them to do their own thing, and even consider a gap year if one is not ready to be completely independent yet, one child’s college years may look very different from the other’s, but hopefully they will each have some version of success.</p>
<p>About GCs, from what I understand, the college application process is pretty much the same no matter where they apply, whether an IVY, mid-tier university, LAC or small independent program. They all need a GC recommendation, right?</p>
<p>And GCs are not all the same. My sons go to extremely different high schools within the same city, and in one school, the guidance counselor communicates with both parents and kids regularly, whereas my other son didn’t even know who his guidance counselor was for years. I just don’t think it’s all a one-size-fits-all-situation, and each parent can decide what’s right when deciding when to step in as parents and when to let the child do the talking.</p>
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<p>It depends on the school. For schools that use the Common App, the GC’s recommendation, called the Secondary School Report (SSR), has a bunch of check boxes and fill-in-the-blanks as well as a spot for the GC to include a narrative recommendation. The importance of the personalized narrative, though, varies with the school. But some schools, generally publics, I believe, don’t require any narrative at all. U of Michigan is an example (at least it was two cycles ago.)</p>
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<p>You think the counselor should explain a B that a student got in a class?</p>
<p>^I don’t think a counselor has to explain a B by any means, but only the counselor can explain a B without the student looking like they are whining. So if it’s really truly true the counselor could say something like “Student x is a stellar student, including receiving a B+ from Teacher Y who historically only gives 1 or 2 A’s per semester.” Or “Please note that while a B might not seem like a very good grade in course x, (or for student x), but Teacher Y has historically given only a few A’s per year.”</p>
<p>^^Looking through my retrospectoscope, I think what I was trying to get at was the potential discordancy between a 35 in ACT English and B’s in English class. Mainly some assurance that the B’s did not indicate that he was slacking off, which he wasn’t. </p>
<p>I think my concern came out of some of the threads about how various parts of data should support each other. Minutiae, I know.</p>
<p>MacTessa: I would love for DS to do a gap year and mature some more, he’s still 16. But no, he’s quite firm he wants to get on with his life’s work.</p>
<p>Honestly though, my older son (aka mathson) got an 800 on the critical reading portion of the SAT twice and never got an A in English till he ditched honors his senior year. The skills to do well on a standardized test and the skills to make an English teacher happy are not the same. (He was a decent writer and a very fast reader, but loathed literary analysis.) I don’t think he’s that rare.</p>
<p>ellemenope…truthfully, I don’t think a “B” needs to be explained, no. I mean really, is a B so terrible? But as I wrote a long ways back on this thread, IF it was something that needed context…I’d only see it along the lines of what mathmom also expressed…something like the student really working hard to get that B+ which in that class was an accomplishment since the teacher rarely awards any As". But generally, I would not see this as needing explaining. </p>
<p>However, even the unweighted rank is on the school profile right? And that also may not need explaining that much as it is implied that those who did not take challenging classes can and are ranked higher than some students who did (as was the case at our HS too). </p>
<p>What I REALLY think should be in the student’s cover letter to the GC isn’t “please explain X and Y on my report” but rather, highlighting many positive things the student accomplished and also his personal traits, and so on </p>
<p>I don’t think having a record that is not perfection needs explainin’.</p>
<p>Son never was one for the straight A’s. Had plenty of them, but you throw a perennial B+ in accelerated Math over the course of three years (finally landed the A for the year with AP Calc Sr. year) and another in US History (getting a 4 on the AP sophomore year) and it will really mess with a great GPA otherwise. But (and I only know this because she signed a book given him) son’s GC said, “in your letter of recommendation, I used a quote from Dwight D Eisnehower, “…the supreme quality of a leader is unquestionably integrity.” You are that kind of leader at XXX and I know you will be at xxx too. You’ve made our school a better place and I’m glad I have had the opportunity to get to know you.”</p>
<p>Kinda makes a B+ in accelerated pre-calc meaningless to me.</p>
<p>mathmom: ditto on the literary analysis.</p>
<p>Actual true story: Jr year they have to write a 10+ page research paper for Honors English. This kid wrote on the Big Bang. Teacher gave him a ‘C’ saying “how do I know you’re not making this up?” Parents said paper was not a C paper. DS decided to write on The Large Hadron Collider which made me nervous. He got the physics teacher to read it and confirm he was not making things up.</p>
<p>While this veers off topic, I can’t help but relate a similar story about a paper. </p>
<p>While this will come across as biased as I’m the mom, my younger D (now 20) is truly a gifted writer (way beyond my level) and has been from a very young age. To give a little context…she wrote a 15 page research paper in 3rd grade on 100 Years of Broadway. Wrote a 90 page musical in 4th grade. In 7th grade, won a first place in state writing contest. In middle school, she took Creative Writing with the HS senior class and a college writing course long distance. When she got to freshmen writing in college, the professors considered her exemplary (this was not her major). Recently, a musical she wrote was produced in NYC and just was selected for a festival. She simply is a very advanced writer. </p>
<p>OK, so in high school, for Chorus class, they had to write a short research paper. At the moment, I cannot recall her topic. But obviously, this is not a class where there is much writing. So, when the chorus teacher handed it back, she doubted it was my D’s own writing and demanded her to pass in her source books. I was pretty stunned. I looked through ever library book she used and not one sentence in her paper was in any single book. Her paper was like any others she writes…entirely her own words, very advanced writing, analysis, creative, etc. Of course, the teacher could not find anything in it that was not hers (this had never happened to D before or after that one time). For this teacher, who not only didn’t deal much with papers from students (as choral teacher and music dept. chair) and also had students of all academic ranges in the school (her subject was not tracked), I guess the paper was “too good.”</p>
<p>Now, you may recall my D had one rec (an optional supplemental rec) from the music dept. chair whom she worked with for five years daily in class and in ECs, and D had also achieved local, state and national awards in this field (highly unusual from our school)…and this was the rec writer who used a form rec letter she uses for all students and pasted in a couple changes except forgot in several places to change the name of the student and had the wrong name scattered in her rec. The irony that she questioned my D’s paper as original or not and her own rec was a formula rec that she tried to pass off as truly about an individual student and even copied the NAME of the student wrong! I don’t think she knew what competent writing really looks like!</p>
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<p>But the ad coms are looking at the overall pattern – if there was only 1 B, then there probably would be no need to explain that it came from a particular teacher who was a tough grader – they would probably assume as much. If there are several B’s, then mentioning that one teacher is a tough grader does nothing to explain the others.</p>
<p>Just my opinion, but I would shy very far away from an explanation focusing on a particular teacher’s grading habits for a mega-selective college. If your kid is applying to MIT (for example) and there is a teacher who is a tough grader and only 1 kid out of 30 in a class gets an A… well that’s the kid MIT wants. So when a GC “explains” that a “B” in a class should be disregarded because that particular teacher only gives out a few A’s (as mathmom suggests) – that’s a red flag annnouncement that there are a handful of very smart kids at the school, and the applicant isn’t one of them. Without the explanation, if there are only a few B’s and no particular pattern of weakness, the ad com might not give it much thought. So the explanation focuses attention on a weakness that might otherwise be disregarded.</p>
<p>It would be different if there was a explanation about extenuating circumstances. For example, if a kid was in injured in an accident and missed several weeks of school one semester, that would be the type of thing where an explanation would give context. </p>
<p>The top schools want the kind of kids who will push the envelope, and who will do well in a very challenging environment. That does not mean they have to be perfect. It’s just that “the teacher grades too hard” is not going to hold much water for them as an explanation. No matter how nicely it is phrased, that “explanation” is an admission that the student was unable to meet that particular teacher’s standards for an A in that course. And I think it could easily be interpreted as meaning that most of the teachers in the school are lenient graders, and the applicant couldn’t really do well with the few teachers who have more rigorous standards. That is especially true when you have a situation where your son’s class rank is not particularly good – the explanation supports an inference that the kid might be a coaster. (That’s a little different than a slacker – by coaster I mean a smart kid in an environment where it is easy to get A’s in most classes without extra effort). Since you have written that very few kids from the school apply to private colleges, the colleges your son is targeting would not have experience with your son’s school – the last thing you want to do is give the impression that the high school lacks rigor. </p>
<p>I am NOT trying to 'bash" you or your kid (you have made some comments about “bashing” in previous posts) – I am trying to point out the pitfalls of this “explanation”. I just don’t think “teacher X is a tough grader” is going to help with highly selective colleges. </p>
<p>It comes back to the old line, when parents ask admission reps from the top schools whether it is better for a kid to get A’s in regular classes, or B’s in AP and Honors classes - - the admission reps invariably reply, they want to see A’s in the AP/honors classes.</p>
<p>Interesting article in the NYT today… </p>
<p>[Advice</a> For The Counselor, When The Parent Is ‘Difficult’ - The Choice Blog - NYTimes.com](<a href=“http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/25/nacac-difficult/]Advice”>Advice for the Counselor, When the Parent Is 'Difficult' - The New York Times)</p>
<p>I have to agree that I would not have explained this B on the counselor report or the student’s own app. I think explaining grades only makes sense for extenuating circumstances such as illness, death in family, or something out of the ordinary and not that the teacher doesn’t give many A’s. That is a common scenario. If the student truly did well in the course and that meant a B+, that’s fine and also could get a rec from that teacher in fact. I sorta worry if we have to go explaining B’s on a report card. It is OK to not have all A’s.</p>
<p>Modadunn, thanks for the link to that article! As a college counselor, that interested me and I was not aware of it. They mention Sally Rubenstone’s (from here at College Confidential) book Panicked Parents’ Guide to College Admissions in fact. </p>
<p>Three things in that article that I agree with…</p>
<p>The college counselor cannot get the student into college, or particularly a college they would not have gotten into otherwise. The counselor can guide the student to put forth the best application possible and also to have the appropriate college list but can’t get the kid admitted. </p>
<p>Many parents and students are unrealistic about their list of colleges and have schools on their list where they don’t stand a chance (I’m not talking of low admit rate elite colleges with highly qualified students who have low odds due to the admit rates). I try hard to show them black and white data and how they don’t fit the profile at all of admitted students. Some get the picture; some don’t. I am rather shocked at times when someone comes to me with colleges on a list that are NOWHERE in their ballpark. </p>
<p>Also, the article mentions parents writing a “rec” for their students to give to the GC to help them write their rec. I am not against that at all. However, I do have STUDENTS write letters to their GC and other rec writers to accomplish that same thing. </p>
<p>Lastly…I have gotten calls late at night too. I end up helping families all seven days of the week at any hour. They seem to expect it too. I got a call at 10 PM one night from someone who was not even a client but had contacted me many times about college counseling and called five minutes before child’s therapy session and wanted my view on this kid’s chances of getting into college (any college). :D</p>
<p>sooziet - I don’t envy your profession. You and doctors must always have people who want free advice. I bet you don’t tell too many people at cocktail parties of your job.</p>
<p>“Just my opinion, but I would shy very far away from an explanation focusing on a particular teacher’s grading habits for a mega-selective college. If your kid is applying to MIT (for example) and there is a teacher who is a tough grader and only 1 kid out of 30 in a class gets an A… well that’s the kid MIT wants. So when a GC “explains” that a “B” in a class should be disregarded because that particular teacher only gives out a few A’s (as mathmom suggests) – that’s a red flag annnouncement that there are a handful of very smart kids at the school, and the applicant isn’t one of them. Without the explanation, if there are only a few B’s and no particular pattern of weakness, the ad com might not give it much thought. So the explanation focuses attention on a weakness that might otherwise be disregarded.”
I think calmom’s post is spot on for the tip-top colleges with thousands of “well qualified” applicants. Drawing attention to a less than spotless transcript with anything that smacks of excuses- “the teacher is a hard grader”-is like shooting oneself in the foot- self defeating, and gives the adcoms a reason to reject a student. At the top colleges, adcoms have more than enough qualified students to fill multiple classes- they are forced by the sheer numbers of applicants to look for reasons to reject a student.</p>
<p>You also don’t want them to think a kid is uptight and worried that they got a B when the class was tough. The thing is, if they attend one of these elite colleges, they will likely get a B again in something because everyone at the college is an “A” kind of student and not every student at that college is gonna score an A in the class. My kid is in grad school at MIT and Bs happen even to very very very hard working kids at schools like that where grading is tough and not every stellar student can earn an A in class.</p>
<p>I would like to stay away from the specifics of DS and wonder what you all would think if a GC had the following in his/her LOR.</p>
<p>Although x’s GPA puts him/her out of the top 5% in class rank, this is largely/partially (whichever is correct) due to the fact that as we do not weight grades, we have significant number of students who opt out of Honors/AP classes in order to achieve a higher rank/GPA. Additionally, we have some Honors teachers who historically give out very few A’s but we encourage the students to take these classes regardless as we believe they are better classes. X chose to follow this path as he/she values learning more than pursuing a higher GPA/rank.</p>
<p>That is all I was looking for. Does that sound so bad? Wouldn’t that leave the adcom with a warm and fuzzy feeling about few scattered B’s and a rank in the 5-10% range?</p>
<p>A CG would NEVER put that kind of an note in a LOR! First of all, they are writing letters for many students, not just one LOR for one student!There may be other students from that school applying to the same colleges. GC’s would never make what could be considered disparaging remarks about other [unnamed] students, or grading patterns for the school as a whole, in order to make one particular student look better! It would make their position as a GC less credible in adcoms eyes. </p>
<p>A good school profile should list what classes are offered, how classes are weighted [or not], the % of students achieving GPA by decile, SAT scores by decile, the number of AP courses and the number of students taking each AP test, and resulting AP scores in each subject for last year, and if the school ranks students.
Adcoms can figure out how rigorous a students class load was in comparison to others by looking at the transcript and school profile.
I suggest you take a look at your schools profile and see if it gives adcoms a full picture of how many students take AP classes and what AP scores are historically achieved.</p>
<p>here is an example of a school profile that gives adcoms the full picture.
<a href=“http://www.menloschool.org/data/files/gallery/DivisionDocument/CollegeProfile0809.pdf[/url]”>http://www.menloschool.org/data/files/gallery/DivisionDocument/CollegeProfile0809.pdf</a></p>