<p>Can a teaching assistant write a letter of recommendation?</p>
<p>Yes, and they often do as intro classes are often large and the TA knows the student much better than the prof.</p>
<p>Thanks entomom. Do you in particular if this applies to Penn, Harvard and Yale?</p>
<p>All three take the common app which requires instructor recs, meaning a prof, ta, etc.</p>
<p>yeah, colleges(adcoms) are usually understanding of this. they know freshman classes at state u's are very large and getting a prof rec is not very intimate, and they dont even know you. i would pick a rec from a ta that i knew over a prof that never knew me anyday-</p>
<p>Thank you for your replies. I called Penn though and they told they recommend that a professor should write the rec in a way that sounded like if a TA did it would be bad for my application</p>
<p>transferguy, so having a TA write a recommendation for Penn is good or bad?</p>
<p>Your question was whether or not you could use a TA for a rec, the answer is still yes. You did NOT ask whether a rec from a prof would be better than a TA. </p>
<p>Given the same rec, I don't doubt that it looks better coming from a prof than a TA, that's a no brainer. However you may have to decide between a good rec from a TA who knows your work and a soso one from a prof who doesn't.</p>
<p>If Penn is telling you that they prefer a rec from a prof, fine, but that's not the question you asked.</p>
<p>transferguy - My suggestion is this. Ask the TA and prof to collaborate on the rec. TA can write the bulk (even all) of it, as he knows you more directly. Prof can add anything he is able and sign off on it with the TA. I have seen college transfer websites recommend this type of collaboration and I think it is the ideal in this situation.</p>
<p>So the rec would look like this:</p>
<p>"blah blah blah blah" </p>
<p>John Doe, Assoc. Prof of xyz
Mary Smith, Teaching Assistant</p>