Letters of recommendation

<p>My D has had her letters of recommendation for awhile, but I can't figure out the best way to handle this: As an MT applicant, D is, of course, applying to many schools. I'd rather send the schools her recommendations via mail than have the college professors and artistic professionals who wrote them individually respond to each school via the common app or the school's own app. IMO, it's a lot to ask people who aleady took the time to write great letters to take the amount of time that will be needed to fill out each school's recommendation checklist/short answer form and send each letter individually electronically. Plus, I am hearing that recommenders, professors particularly, are having a hard time with the common app, and that this isn't a new or fixed problem. The couple recommendation checklist forms I have seen have indicated that a letter may be used in lieu of the checklist/short answer form, but do all accept letters instead? I can't see the requirements since I'm obviously not a recommender. </p>

<p>I'm sure D's recommenders will do whatever is asked, but I just feel bad having D ask people to go through all of this since she's applying to so many schools. How have others handled this? </p>

<p>If your D’s school uses Naviance they should get loaded and distributed that way to all schools. (which is what my D’s school did) For the school where I teach, we just use common app, and we load that way. When I log on, I get a message letting me know who has listed me as a recommender and go from there. It could be a clearer system, but not the end of the world. </p>

<p>myloves, are these artistic or academic recommendations? We mailed most of the artistic recommendations unless otherwise specified. The academic recommendations went with her transcript from the school which was also mailed.</p>

<p>These are both artistic and academic. (My D’s academic ones are from college professors instead of high school teachers.)</p>

<p>@LoveMyMTGirl‌ , do you know if the recommenders filled out the checklist/short answer form as well as send letters, or did they “just” send letters?</p>

<p>The artistic recommendations were just letters. The academic recommendations went with the transcript as well as any special forms the school requested to be filled out. We brought those to the school counselor and they bundled it all together, put everything in sealed envelopes with a special school label across the seal, and had us mail them.</p>

<p>The Common App stuff seems to be fine so far this year (last year there were changes), and it’s pretty helpful to everyone to use that system. I’m a high school arts teacher and have to submit many letters through Naviance/common app. I find it much easier than printing and mailing letters!</p>

<p>When my son applied to acting programs, for which some of the artistic recs had to be submitted separately, we provided stamped, addressed envelopes to his non-school-based recommenders, and the college counseling office took care of the others. It IS complicated. We gave the college counselor a spreadsheet!</p>

<p>By the way, our school’s college counseling office has asked the faculty NOT to fill out the checklists (for several reasons), but either way–for colleges that use the Common App, the teacher only has to do it once, and then it goes to all the schools. </p>

<p>Our Recs are all college professors as well, so we emailed the Common App for clarification on how this should be handled online. This is their response:</p>

<p>"You can invite your professors as teachers. You should send the below information to them so they know how to fill out the Teacher Evaluation Form.</p>

<p>If you are a professor at a college, and have been invited as a teacher to fill out school forms for a student, please note that the Teacher Evaluation form is intended for High School Teachers.</p>

<p>If you wish to submit this form on behalf of your student, you may, but please see below for instructions on how to complete the form:</p>

<p>For your PROFILE: In the school look up question in your profile, you will need to do a search for the school that you currently teach. More than likely it will not be in this list. Please select ‘I don’t see my high school on this list’. You will then be taken to a screen where you can enter in your school (even though it says high school, please put in the college for which you work)."</p>

<p>Thank you so much, everyone! I feel calmer. </p>

<p>I knew I couldn’t be the only one wondering if this was all too much for the recommenders!</p>

<p>@Times3‌ , do you know why the counselors asked teachers to not fill out the forms? I’m just curious…</p>

<p>I’ll PM you!</p>