I am having a difficult time navigating the various application requirements of all the different schools. For example, Letters of Recommendation. I am being told that my daughter has to “invite” artistic recommenders under the “other section” on the common app, yet her Guidance counselor said my D cannot do that. Our Guidance counselor is great but she has no clue about Performing arts schools Or their requirements. Another example is U of AZ…they do not want transcripts sent…so I have to explain this to GC…but she says she’s sending it out…because that’s what she does And better they should just have it than not. It has become a hair pulling experience to say the least, trying to communicate and orchestrate the materials needed. Thanks for any insight.
@MTbound So sorry to hear about this. Unfortunately, it seems to be more common than not that people doing this process have challenges with their guidance offices - unless they are at a PA school. I would try explaining to them how much easier their life is if they upload letters and transcripts to the common application as it means they do it once for all of the schools you have on there. The school then downloads those. The other thing I wonder is if there are people who handle the “standard” process and people who handle the non-standard. Our school is quite small, but our guidance counselor handled the standard uploads and one of the secretaries in the office handled the sending of all transcripts that needed to be mailed. It might be worth asking if there are different people for different parts of the process. Good Luck!
My kids received the artistic recommenders outside of the common app and Naviance; academic recommenders through an “invite”. Generally, they either had to send the artistic recommendations separately to the schools or, in some cases, the schools want the artistic recommendations directly from the recommenders. In that case, we would provide stamped envelopes to the recommender.
Some of the colleges have you send links directly to the outside recommender. If they gave you this option, I used it. Some just asked for outside artistic recommenders to be uploaded, so have the letter scanned into your computer for that. Or sometimes, you just have to mail the letter snail mail direct from the recommender to the admissions office. If you have to do that, give the recommender a self-addressed stamped envelope so all they have to do is drop it in the mailbox or have them give it back to you and you can mail. This way you know its DONE!
Unfortunately, I have found that there is no consistency in this process and each school handles things differently. It can be confusing and frustrating.
I would also add that I would encourage the recommender to keep their letter saved on their computer in case of any delivery mishaps or additional needs. Seems common sense, but if they think it is a one time deal, they may not think to save it.