recommendation letters dilemma

Applying to College
1

<p>my teachers wrote me letters for a school i decided not to apply to after all. instead of throwing the letters away, i read them. one of them was okay, but a little vague. It used words like "motivated, mature, thoughtful, creative..."</p>

<p>The other one SUCKED. i gave the teacher some info about me (gpa, test scores, activities) and a list of my hobbies and achievements. And she regurgitated them onto the paper. This is a teacher who had me for 3 years, and most of her letter was stuff that could have been found on my application. She even got some info wrong (she said i had been an active member of spanish club for 4 years, even though i quit during 10th grade. maybe because she was my spanish teacher?) This teacher always bragged about how good she was at writing recommendation, but all she did was repeat info that colleges will already have!</p>

<p>I'm very disappointed. I am going to apply to a few more safety schools. I think I;ll ask the first teacher to print out another letter of recommendation for me, but should I find a new teacher altogether for the 2nd rec? I think it's too late to do anything about the disappointing letters. The only way to change it would be to go to the advising office at my school on monday morning and tell them not to mail my school packet (w/ the 2nd rec), and go ask another teacher to write a rec. I realize that it was unethical to read the letters (but what would you have done?), so I really don't want to tell my advisor that I did. Will a bad rec hurt me?</p>

2

<p>That is suprising that your second teacher wrote such a non-introspective recommendation. You might want to ask another teacher but say that you want to change your recommender for a few schools for another reason like diversity or something.</p>

<p>Also, most top schools don't require two letters. Only ivies and a few do. Most schools below rank USNEWs 15 only want 1. </p>

<p>Sad thing with your teacher, but give her credit. Some teachers have things come up and mabye she just had something come up that prevented her from thinking more for yoru rec. Nonetheless, I believe no teacher should do a rec. half-hearted - either do it with every ounce of your effort or just don't do it. A teacher that writes like 30-50 recommendations isn't doing those students a favor if he spends so little time on it - the teacher who selectively writes only 3-4 does a much better job.</p>

3

<p>"Also, most top schools don't require two letters. Only ivies and a few do. Most schools below rank USNEWs 15 only want 1. "</p>

<p>Since when? Last time I checked most want two.</p>

4

<p>Yes, a bad rec will hurt quite a bit.. Unless you don't apply to the top 50.</p>