<p><em>shakes head</em> Well, thank gosh everything will be alright now!</p>
<p>This type thing is going on with my S right now, except that the teacher is somewhat of an absent-minded professor type and we anticipated this. S still wanted him to write the rec b/c they get along so well, he teaches him 2 courses, and S is his T.A. so S knew he'd write a great rec for him.
Our solution was to give him a deadline that is earlier than the college's actually is. So now that S is going to ask tomorrow if he sent it, we really have a little time to play with. He may well have sent it, but if not...there is a window of time. Hope this advice helps someone.</p>
<p>My S must ask his English teacher this week if he has written his recs yet. We have 3 EA apps with Dec 1 deadlines, so we are trying to keep on top of things. </p>
<p>You mentioned flowers. Appropriate to give a little gift to teacher who writes recs? I was going to wait until an acceptance was received, then I think it would be a nice thing to do!</p>
<p>Well all the recs were in on time, the transcripts were ordered (even paid extra to rush), but GC has had them sitting on her desk for 2 weeks. Since they weren't ED she moved them to the bottom of the list. Provided addressed envelopes with stamps and the EA dates, but EA meant nothing to her so she decided to keep putting them to the bottom until Nov. 15th. The GC my D has had for 3 yrs is on medical leave, so they have a temp. So what does admin in all their wisdom do, replace the GC that handled all the AP students with the GC who handles "academic at risk" students. She has never done a college rec.!!! We talk to her at least once a week and she promises to get them out, we'll see if she did it today.</p>
<p>"So what does admin in all their wisdom do, replace the GC that handled all the AP students with the GC who handles "academic at risk" students. She has never done a college rec.!!! "</p>
<p>Oh my gosh, it's a wonder any of our public school kids get accepted anywhere! (I'm assuming that's a public school, fosselover). Please no flames, I'm a public school teacher and my kids go to public high school. It's just that so many public high school folks have no idea about the intricacies of EA/ED/recs, etc... And it does matter.</p>
<p>I'm so glad this worked out. What a scare!</p>
<p>ctymom:</p>
<p>While I have every sympathy for your son, I suspect that the teacher at the time had every intention of writing a letter and a strong one on his behalf. Adn at the time, it did not seem like such an onerous chore. Since there were six weeks, there did not seem to be such urgency either. So it was easy for him to delay writing it. But as another poster mentioned, every English or social studies teacher gets swamped with requests for recommendations; so under this deluge of requests and other work, the teacher must have forgotten.
The lesson to draw from this is to give an earlier deadline to rec writers and to remind them at intervals of the due date.</p>
<p>My son asked some profs to write letters of recommendation last spring. They did not. During summer, they were unavailable. Throughout September and half of October, he phoned and emailed weekly to prod them into writing the letters they had promised him. The letters arrived just in the nick of time for him to apply to a program with a deadline of Nov. 1.</p>
<p>Yes, Marite, I'm a writing teacher, too, and I used to be an English instructor at a university. I know what you're taking about. But I also have always had an appointment book. It doesn't really take much of an effort to keep dates and commitments straight no matter how many obligations one has taken on. And if one has too many, then one should say no. It's really that simple. The message here was clear--"I am far more important than anything I could possibly have promised to you could ever have been."</p>
<p>ctymom, really glad it worked out! You should at least threaten to sue. Or report him to the administration. It is the school's responsibility to make sure that applications are sent in time and are complete as far as I know. At least our school (which isn't all that great) takes it that way.</p>
<p>Achat, although I deeply appreciate the emotional support of all those who have responded here ( this is my only child and he means everything to me), we just don't sue, or even threaten to sue, people. We just live for the day when our son is out of that school. Until then, we will make biscotti and send flowers to the few who are supportive of him and hope for the best. He's far less emotional about this than I am, and for that I am most grateful.</p>
<p>ctymom, I am like that too, the type who does not sue but is extremely angry inside (and that is not healthy as my bp monitor would tell me). So I understand. And it would make me a LOT more angry than my son. And you have touched a nerve here...what a mind-numbing bum!!!</p>
<p>Achat:
I hope the teacher is suitably repentant at having jeopardized the chances of admission of a student he must have liked enough to be willing to write a rec for. And perhaps, he will be more careful in the future. Negligent though the teacher was, however, there may be a huge downside to forcing the issue. </p>
<p>It could lead the school to severely limiting the number of schools a student may apply to; teachers may limit the number of students they are willing to write letters for, leaving others to scramble; teachers may even refuse outright to write any letters, since it is unlikely that writing letters of recommendation is spelled out as part of their contractual obligation. Indeed, we saw that in another thread concerning a teacher who was refusing to send out a rec for a scholarship as of the day the teachers were going to work to rule. </p>
<p>My S is going to remind his teachers well before the Christmas holidays to have his recs ready. The deadline is December 31, but there is no way to contact his teachers during the week prior to that to make sure that they have sent out the recs.</p>
<p>Yes, you are right about that. If I were a student, I would also try not to get recommendations from teachers who are irresponsible if you know about them from before. Last year, my son's AP teacher was one of them. Thankfully, my son knew ahead of time and did not ask.</p>
<p>I agree with Marite that I doubt this teacher's intentions at the start were to NOT write the rec. I know you said he could have just said "no" back then. But my assumption is that he wanted to write it but was negligent and irresponsible and/or disorganized, and did not note the deadline and forgot. None of that is excusable, mind you, but it appears to be what happened. It is quite disconcerting and irritating to say the least! But it happens a LOT. </p>
<p>As I mentioned previously, the majority of people my daughter asked this fall also seemed to forget or not heed the deadlines she gave them. Unlike your son, she did not give a deadline when it was due at admissions. At our school, the rec letters all get sent to the guidance counselor who then packages up everything on the school's end into one envelope. My D gave a deadline for when she wanted it to the GC and to correlate with when she would be sending in her part of the application. As the due date came, a few days beforehand, she checked in with each person and in most cases, the person forgot and did not realize it had to be done yet, though she clearly stated a due date (to GC office) in her comprehensive cover letters to them. But once she checked in, all got it to her within a day or two. I think one thing you learn in this process is to check, check, check on everything. Nobody is going to care like you do about your applications. </p>
<p>As well, it is good to check with each college that they received everything. I had something weird happen yesterday with one of my D's colleges and I never would have known had I not checked! This particular college had sent a letter acknowledging that my D was an applicant and gave her an ID number she could use to check online about her status as an applicant and so forth. I decided to go look it up. This college actually noted every single piece of the application process and on which date each piece was received and filed. It noted each thing was indeed there and then it stated that her application was "complete". However, one line item baffled me. It said "audition not scheduled". For this particular college, the way auditions get reserved is ONLY done online at an audition reservation webpage (the rest of her application was all hard copy). In fact, this school was on the "late" side in setting up the website for audition reservations. I had even called admissions the first week in Oct. to find out when the reservation site would go up and was told in a few days. By networking on this website, I found out from others the morning it was available and I went to the website and reserved my D's audition date (which is very tricky overall to coordinate all these dates in a three month period amongst 8 schools with very limited choices given). I printed out her audition appointment information and the receipt of my credit card payment for the audition fee. So, when I saw this line item on her webpage yesterday, it provoked me to call admissions to inquire. The admissions secretary looked my D up on the computer and said she had NO record of any audition appointment sent from the Drama school to their office. I mentioned how I reserved it the very first day reservations were allowed to be scheduled and had a printout of it. I was starting to worry knowing how these dates fill up and this college's audition date was coordinated with another audition my D has at a school in that same state, involving flights and so forth. She was very nice and told me to fax it to her and she would take care of it. Had I not checked, we would have arrived in that state at that school with no record of her audition slot being reserved! So, even having a paper confirmation in hand is not everything. </p>
<p>I had an e mail confirmation earlier this fall for my D's appointment with an admissions counselor at a college we were visiting. We got there and the person who made that reservation on the phone and confirmed in an email, was at the desk and had down a completely different time that would not work and again, they were very nice but my D had to double up with the admissions counselor in the appointment due to this error. Again, a written confirmation still was not enough! </p>
<p>continued...</p>
<p>Wow, Soozie. Doesn't it make you wonder how the kids would ever get it done on their own if we decide they had to ( as I did when I was applying--reminiscent of the "Raised by wolves" thread)?</p>
<p>But as far as recommendations......here's one for ya....as long as we are commiserating....One of the supplemental recs my D was getting was from the music department head at our school, someone she has had for five years in several capacities who agreed to write on her behalf. Now, unbeknownst to her, for the supplemental recs, my D asked four people, intending to just use the two best recs, once they were received by the guidance counselor, as these are optional recs in the first place. This was one of the people who forgot the due date my D had given her but when my D went into check, she wrote it and gave it to her the next day. That rec truly irritates me. What I am about to say does not reflect, I am sure, with what this person thinks of my D, but rather it shows a lack of effort with writing teacher recs overall as I think this was what she would write no matter who who the student is. </p>
<p>It is SOOOOO obvious she had a form letter she writes for every child. My D put more into an extensive cover letter (and resume) where she mentioned highlights of her time with this person and what she was going to be highlighting on her own application and much else. She gave her plenty to use on top of what anyone who had this much connection with a kid could have written regardless. Instead, her letter was obvious one she had used for other kids and she "plugged" in information on my D, regurgitating some facts off her resume...she won X award, Y award, blah, blah, in one or two "individualized" lines, the rest being her basic form letter about any kid. She even said to my D "look, I really used the information you gave me!" The whole letter was not personal at all, and in fact, only dealt with "chorus" which she teaches but in my D's case, my D had also done four high school musicals with her as music director, usually as the lead, had been the high school lead as a middle schooler (quite unusual there), and is going into that field in college which is why she wanted this supplemental rec from someone at her school who worked with her in that capacity for five years. The teacher never even mentioned any of the theater work, likely due to the fact that her formulatic letter she had written on the other kids mostly dealt with choral music which is what most kids would have had her for. In fact, the icing on the cake was that in one line she left in the name "Jessica" when that is not my D's name! She has no clue how hard it is to get into the programs my D is going for and how such a formula rec is meaningless. I have no idea what else my D could do given that she made it easier for the rec writer by writing a very thoughtful individualized cover letter pertaining to her work with each of the rec writers. Needless to say, she did not use this rec but used two that were personalized and much better. It does not mean the other two people felt more highly about her but just that this first teacher was not truly doing her job in this regard with truly no effort put into such an important matter. She obviously gives the same letter to every kid and on two lines, changes some facts off their resumes (which is also not helpful as it is right on the resume and not needing repeating). Thankfully she does have some very good recs but seeing this lack of effort is bothersome and points out that even if you have many teachers who think well of you, it does not mean they are a good rec writer or that they will get you the rec on time, etc. etc. </p>
<p>For some reason, this was not the only "problem" with recs this fall with this kid. A fourth supplemental rec writer, a director my child has known for seven years in her summer program, had agree to write for my child. Again, she was only going to pick two of the supplemental writers of the four she asked to write and thank God she asked four as she only got two out of it when all was said and done (taking out the music dept. head one above and now this one I am sharing about). When my D got home from her six weeks at the program (seventh summer), there was still another three week session going on there. She contacted the program to get the addresses of these two directors who said they would write for her so she would have the contact information for September when she planned to send them a cover letter and resume. One of the two people sent his contact information. The second director misunderstood the request and assumed she wanted the rec immediately while the summer program was in full throttle (she only wanted the contact information for the fall as he lives in NYC and we live in VT). He wrote an e mail back telling her to have her parents write the rec and he would sign it as it was so hectic at the camp session right then (which truthfully it is 24/7 getting the shows up in 2 1/2 weeks time). I was flabbergasted as such a thought! She wrote back telling him that she was not looking for the rec now but only wanted his winter address in NYC so she would be sending him the information in early fall. He emailed his NYC address to her. In early September, my D sent him her individualized cover letter and her theatrical resume in snail mail. She never got anything by the deadline (she was like 0 for 5 with people getting it to her by the deadline! other than the GC's one) and so she sent him a couple emails, thinking perhaps he never got the package she sent via snail mail. He never responded to the emails and we don't have his phone number. My D did not want to network to find out his phone number. I have no idea what happened as I know he thinks highly of her and was willing to write for her in the fall and sent his contact information for that purpose. So, luckily she had two good supplementals to use but this was all quite disappointing to say the least. </p>
<p>So, CTYmom, as you can see, there are other "lax" rec writers out there who don't meet deadlines, don't put much effort into the letters, who don't respond, etc. etc. It takes a lot of checking up on the kid's part and you live and learn. While it is irritating to say the least, I must say that it is not so uncommon afterall. You can't rely 100% on folks and must be proactive and check up on everything because nobody cares about your son's app process more than you guys so ya gotta keep after the people or parts you can't control, even though I wholeheartedly agree with you that a professional should be organized and make note in their calendar of commitments they have made and so forth. My D had to keep after several people. My other D did not have this happen and so I was not expecting it this time around but I guess it happens.</p>
<p>All I can say is that I have always believed that I should be fired if I ever started exhibiting such unprofessional behavior. I must be incredibly naive for a 50-year-old.</p>
<p>Geez, Soozie, I'm almost glad my S has not read any of the letters that have been sent out for him! </p>
<p>S can check online for his EA school, but all it says is that all required documents have been received. It strongly discourages applicants from contacting the admissions, office, so we have to trust that the non-required, extra documents have also been received. At least we know they were sent. </p>
<p>His transcript went out yesterday to the college (Friday was end of the marking period). I asked S if he knew his grades. "No, I figure I'll find out when my report card is sent home." At least, he does not have high blood pressure. :)</p>
<p>Yep, Marite, that reminds me of last year and again this year, of how important it is to also check on your child's transcript that it is correct in every respect before the GC sends it out. In both my kids' cases, corrections were needed on their transcripts and I am glad we checked. In fact, come to think of it, her marking period report card had an error and that was going out to an EA school last week and luckily I had that fixed too. Ya live and learn! I have no clue what kids who have uninvolved parents do because some of these errors are problematic to the kid's admissions process. </p>
<p>I shared last year on here how INCORRECT in SEVERAL respects our school profile was and I was the one who went in and had them fix it for all kids, as they seemed quite unaware of the negative affect it would have on many applicants. Same with the transcript errors. </p>
<p>Susan</p>
<p>Geez, Susan, this teacher (who mistook your daughter for Jessica) is as bad as the other one who forgot to send in the rec!</p>