<p>A strong teacher recommendation can add flesh, bones and personality to a packet of test scores and grade point averages and convince a college admissions director that a particular student would be a valuable asset on campus.</p>
<p>Many teachers -- already busy scoring exams, coaching, advising extracurricular clubs and performing other administrative duties -- find themselves swamped writing recommendations. They might be more stressed than ever because of the trend of students applying to more colleges, necessitating more letters.</p>
<p>"In times past we would discourage multiple applications because it would mean unnecessary work on everyone's part," said Michael Mulligan, head of the Thacher School, an Ojai boarding school whose 67 senior class members are all applying to competitive four-year colleges. "Now, unless they're outstanding in every way, students just don't know what's going to happen."</p>
<p>The anecdote that stunned me was the (public school) teacher who was writing 37 recommendations...for ONE student! I'm surprised that the school doesn't have some limit on the total number of recommendations that a single student can ask for. Or maybe the teacher should have said that was too many? Or is this just part of the territory for teachers these days?</p>
<p>Well, if your GC/CC give you list of more than 30 or 40 recomended schools, then why shouldn't he/she obliged to write you 37 letters? .... That said, nowadays with online applications, skyrocket tuitions, application fee waives, etc. Kids/parents apply schools like play lottery tickets. For different reasons, safties, execuse to visit school if acceptted (yay, I know sounds rediculus, but I heard), compare FA packages (parents most interested), etc.</p>
<p>
[quote]
It is that descriptive quality that catches the attention of Mary Backlund, director of admissions at Bard College, a small liberal arts campus in New Hampshire that is popular with California students. She can immediately tell the thoughtful letters from the cut-and-paste jobs from teachers who are distracted or don't know a student very well.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Did Bard move?? Let's hope the author& the editor are not writing any recommendation letters.</p>
<p>Daughter applied to 12 schools, had 2 teachers write one recommendation letter each, one letter from her college counselor. Secretaries put the same packet together for all of those schools, and we were done. Teachers at her school are not obligated to write letters, many of them would limit to number of letters they would write/year.</p>
<p>Our hs (public, 1600 students) has a straightforward and relatively pain-free rec procedure. At the end of junior year, each student asks 2 teachers for a recommendation. Some teachers are known to limit the number they'll write. Teachers submit the letters by mid-September to the guidance office, which sends copies of both recs with the transcript, GC rec, and school profile to each school the student applies to. The student almost never sees the recs (though one teacher, who wrote my youngest d's, makes a practice of sharing his letters even though the right to see them is almost universally waived).</p>
<p>Such letters can't be personalized to the individual school (no "Alyssa's strengths in translating Vergil make her an ideal candidate as a classics major at Princeton" or whatever; no "Brian reminds me so much of myself as a committed student that I know he'll maximize his opportunities at Cornell, as I did.") Some teachers might do this for one specific school, if asked, but I don't know how the guidance department would handle it - it would be such a break with procedure that I wouldn't be surprised to see the Princeton letter wind up at Stanford. </p>
<p>I do think it would be beyond inconsiderate to ask a teacher to personalize 37 recommendation letters. Even asking the teacher to crank out 37 xeroxed copies is pretty nervy.</p>
<p>frazzled, that is how it's done at our school as well. However, the GC asked the kids which of their schools was their number one choice. I think the GC personalizes that one letter for the kids- stressing the fit, the desire, etc.</p>
<p>It's not necessarily the rec letter itself that is time consuming--write one and be done with it. Some schools want teachers to fill out charts and write short answers to questions. Multiply that by XXX and that can get to be a lot of work.</p>
<p>Our hs had two strict rules - students could only ask 2 teachers and all requests for all schools had to be submitted by 11/15. The second part was hard but I think fair. Our GC told me he is revising his recommendation of just applying to 8 schools -- says that's just not realistic given the insane competition.</p>
<p>ellemope - Totally agree with you on how some schools (MIT is one) make so much more work for the teachers with all the specific questions and grids and do not ask for the letter which the teachers have all put effort into. Annoying.</p>
<p>Actually our public HS's process much alike what frazzled1 described. When I say 30/40 letters, I was thinking the letter was send to 30/40 colleges. I really don't think a public HS teacher could write that many letter just for one student. With common app forms, I think they just use copies.</p>
<p>The thing is if a GC/CC give you > 30 recomend colleges, that simply means either he/she is not well familier with the colleges and the students or just not compete him/herself....should he be punished, while he/she got paid to do his/her job? Yes (imho). But another side of me could argue, if he is already incompete then with swamped letter could only make things worse.</p>
<p>Our hs has streamlined the teacher recommendation process. They write one letter for any student requesting and submit the original to the guidance office. The student's gc then includes a copy of the letter in each application packet. If a student gets more recommendations than required, the student can decide to send all the recommendations or have the gc select the ones to be submitted. Students never see the letters, though in our son's case he was told that one recommendation was outstanding enough that it would be included with every application packet.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The thing is if a GC/CC give you > 30 recomend colleges, that simply means either he/she is not well familier with the colleges and the students or just not compete him/herself....should he be punished, while he/she got paid to do his/her job?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Not necessarily.</p>
<p>Depending on what a family's financial situation is, a student may need to cast a wide net of schools in order to make college possible. If a family is in the "middle class squeeze" where they may be "too rich" for need based aid, and "too poor" for to pay full freight, casting a wide net of schools that offer merit money may be their only alternative as far as affording colleges. I would suggest looking up some of curmudgeon's older post because he turned approach to an art form when helping his D find colleges.</p>
<p>Low income students are in even a more precarious postion and will have to hedge their bets and apply to a large number of schools, because most public universities, which are suppose to be the affordable option, does not meet 100% demonstrated need. In NYS a student with a "0" EFC unless they get one of the few SUNY HEOP seats, even after receiving full Pell, Full Tap and Maxing out on the subsidized Stafford Loan and Perkins Loan will still fall short when it comes to living on campus at a 4 year SUNY school. </p>
<p>For this student maxing out the SUNY, CUNY & College board fee waivers will apply to 14 schools before even touching the 37 private colleges that offer HEOP or schools where they can apply free on-line, or have their counselor use the NACAC fee waiver. In this situation, it would not be unusal for a family to apply to 30 schools </p>
<p>Considering the fact that there are over 3000 colleges in this country, I actually, a it is a GC who can not come up with a large number of schools that will meet their student's need (whatever it is) who is the incompetent counselor.</p>
<p>Since most of the students that I work with are in the second scenario, I do not count it robbery (in fact I make it my business) to help them match up a list of schools where they stand a good chance of being admitted and getting the aid that they need. So for this student if it takes filing a few more applications, then so be it.</p>