Thanks so much – I did look through the solution center but I hadn’t found exactly the answer I was looking for, which was why I thought I’d try here. I do think it’s a good idea to reach out to them if we can’t figure it out with her GC, though.
Do all/most colleges provide a written letter of scholarship as well as anything provided on the student’s online campus portal?
@amsunshine My understanding is that “Teacher” recs would go through Naviance (https://appsupport.commonapp.org/applicantsupport/s/article/How-do-I-add-and-assign-recommenders-if-my-school-uses-Naviance) and “Other Recommender” through Common App, but the availability of “Other Recommender” varies by college. All the colleges I looked at include a category for “other” under “Other Recommender” at the bottom of the category drop-down menu.
Yes. For al of the schools where S19 got merit, we also got a hard copy of his offer in the mail.
@amsunshine – at our Senior College Night this past week, our GC said the following:
– In Naviance, request transcripts for colleges you’re applying
– GC then loads those colleges and they are “Colleges I am Applying to” (I think our school does this manually, not sure why. Maybe b/c we have to pay for transcripts?
– Request teacher recs for each college – the specific ones you want. If you have a teacher rec who is not a teacher at the school, he told us to email their email address to your GC and they will add them to Naviance so you can select/invite them. We have to do this b/c one of S’s teacher recs retired this year.
He specifically said if you use Common App to invite a recommendation, it will be considered “other recommender” – not a teacher rec. He also said if you don’t have Colleges I’m Applying to loaded FIRST, then then Naviance will not let you choose which recommendations to use for which colleges. Instead it will just pick one randomly if a college only wants 1, for example.
Mind you, we haven’t done this yet – just relaying the instructions we got. When my D18 went through, they had a more paper-based system for recs and transcripts.
Hope this helps!
Thank you!!! I hope we are able to have the GC add the cc teacher to Naviance, as you describe. It would be a shame if we had to have him write and send separate letters to different schools. Fingers crossed this will be simple. (D21’s school is very small and most kids attend in state colleges which don’t require recommendations, so I suspect this might be new to her.)
My D21 didn’t initially see the “Other” under the “Other recommender” category, as it looked like the list ended before that. However, I took a look myself and found it. Thanks – if all else fails with the GC and Naviance, this will probably be what we resort to.
Schools won’t add any recommendations In Naviance other than school teachers. If this is a CC teacher, kids need to invite him/her through common app by mentioning his/her email id in the other recommender section of CA.
Thanks. OK, so, does this mean that if a particular school does not have an option for “other recommender”, the CC teacher recommendation letter will not be available for that school at all?
IF that is the case, then maybe the professor would be willing to snailmail the letter (if you provide the stamped envelopes)?
Your daughter could email her admissions counselors, explain the situation, and ask if it’s okay if the professor sends the letter through regular mail.
(Of course that’s only if there is no way at all to get the letter submitted through the Common App with the Naviance situation).
I don’t understand about how to apply for many EA. I thought you can only apply one private and 1 public school for EA?
@Suave123 – This must be a school decision. Our GC who manages our Naviance specifically said he would add other teachers (recently retired or DE) to our school’s Naviance so they can be teacher recommenders. He won’t add other types of recommenders – like youth group leaders, employers, etc.
I have always heard that personal statements should not be about something that you can find from the rest of the application, such as EC and awards.
A few colleges have restrictions on applying elsewhere while applying through their EA. Most colleges do not have restrictions. Check each college’s website.
You are thinking about ED. ED is restricted, but EA is not.
@JanieWalker Thank you for explaining!! I was wondering how letters of reco’s worked since my son has a few schools on his common app and was thinking it would be exhausting for teachers to get multiple requests and email invites may be lost!
^And/or @anaray may have been thinking of Single Choice Early Action, sometimes also referred to as Restrictive Early Action, though those were not quite the usual restrictions
Oh! Thank you! So many jargons and I am so lost!
When my D was looking at Yale EA, it said that you can’t apply to any other private college as EA. So I thought that public colleges work that way too! Thank you for explaining this to me.
@evergreen5 is right – I forgot about SCEA, which is single choice early action, and works similarly to ED.