<p>I can understand the concept behind them, but at the end of the day, they seem pointless.
What is the point of having every applicant submit a letter or a few stating how fantastic he or she is? Its not like anyone is going to have a letter of recommendation from someone who will tear him or her apart.</p>
<p>If you have hundreds of students with similar GPA, test scores, extracurricular activities, awards, schedules, etc., is getting a hundreds of letter saying so and so is great going to make the selection process any easier?</p>
<p>Also, just because a teacher thinks highly of a particular student, does not mean everyone else. If fact, you could have one teacher that loves you while most of your other teachers are annoyed with you. Yet, if you only need one letter, you are in golden.
Most importantly, part of the admittance of a student depends on the writing of another individual, which is not fair. Wouldnt having an experienced English teacher most likely produce a more eloquent letter than a math teacher? Additionally, a teacher may be more into it than another. </p>
<p>Ex. Lets say there are two students very similar in terms of schedule, GPA, test scores, leadership, personality, extra curic., etc. They dont have the teacher writing their recs, but both teachers absolutely love the student they are writing for. Teacher A might write _____ is the best student I have had the pleasure of teaching in 40 years. He possesses unmatched leadership and knowledge. Everyone always turns to him when they need help and he never turns an individual away. Teacher B might write ___ is a good student. He is a leader. He doesnt minding helping out others.</p>
<p>Based on those recs, doesnt Teacher As student seem better?</p>
<p>The view of many universities, particularly vast majority of public universities, is that such letters are of no value because they don’t even want them. Moreover, unless the student made a serious error in judgment in picking the author, the letters will uniformly praise the student, but the only ones that leave any real impression are ones that the chosen teacher will spend significant time on and most teachers with lots of requests don’t have the time to do that. Absent that kind of letter, they usually have little value. Also, those who get that kind of attention from the teacher in a letter are usually the best students who don’t need a great letter of recommendation.</p>
<p>LORs are just part of the tapestry of information a school has to try to evaluate a mass of applicants who can often start to look pretty much alike on paper. It’s not like that’s the only thing they use.</p>
<p>In one recent info session the presenter said “2-3 letters. Not 27 letters. And someone did submit 27 letters last year.” When someone in the audience asked if he had been admitted she said “no, he wasn’t”.</p>
<p>I agree with OP about the questionable value of recommendation letters. They create a tremendous amount of busy work for teachers and counselors, and their contents are self-serving: It is in the best interests of both the student and the teachers/counselors for as many students in the school as possible to be admitted to as many good colleges as possible, so there is an incentive to make every student sound wonderful. </p>
<p>The only real value I see in them is in the case of students who are unable to secure the requisite number of LORs in order to apply to a particular college, and thus the LORs work as a weeding-out mechanism for the colleges. I imagine this occurs only cases of students who have engaged in egregiously bad behavior. These students will likely attend state colleges that do not require LORs.</p>
<p>Back in the last century, I served as an alum recruiter for my full-recognizable-here-at-CC-highly-selective-LAC, and not only were the teacher’s letters of recommendations read very carefully, my interview reports were read carefully. In the case of one applicant whose letters arrived, but whose application itself was delayed, I received an international phone call from the admissions office asking what was up.</p>
<p>1) While most letters of rec are probably like wallpaper, I think there are enough exceptions for colleges to continue to solicit them. A letter that says ‘this is the most extraordinary student I’ve had in my 20 years as a teacher’ is going to get some attention. A letter that says ‘X has been a pleasure to teach’ probably isn’t.</p>
<p>2) Most adcoms don’t want extra paper of any kind so if these letters were of little or no value, my guess is that they would have ditched them long ago.</p>
<p>Considering many graduate school admissions committees don’t even take letters of rec seriously, I do have to wonder how necessary they are for undergraduate admissions. </p>
<p>The “similar GPA/scores/ECs/awards” problem is meant to be solved with the essay(s), correct?</p>
<p>I agree - What’s the point of every student applying to go to their favorite teacher and have them write about them. I think what would be interesting would be to have you find a teacher who doesn’t particularly like you, then have them write about how you could be better, just to show you’re not perfect, lol.</p>
<p>I imagine most letters of recommendation are standard boilerplate, and not especially informative. But a thoughtful teacher who really knows the student can sometimes write an informative letter that either reinforces other elements of the student’s application, or points out something about the student that may not be obvious from the rest of the application materials.</p>
<p>So, for example, a letter that says, “Jane is an outstanding student and a joy to have in the classroom” adds nothing to the file. But consider a letter that says: “Jane has developed a keen appreciation and intense passion for Shakespeare. She now reads and speaks Elizabethan English like a native speaker, and her performance as the female lead in our school production of Romeo and Juliet was electrifying.” To me, the latter rec is informative. It describes somewhat unusual strengths, talents, and interests of the student, and it underscores and gives external validation to other information that may be coming out in the applicant’s essays, ECs, and elsewhere. It may resonate with the admissions committees at some colleges more than others—it will probably help more at a college with a strong English department and a tradition of putting on a lot of Shakespeare plays than at a STEM-oriented school, for example, but that’s just fine if that’s who this kid really is. Those are just exactly the “fit” factors the admissions committees are looking for.</p>
<p>I’ve heard a number of admissions officers say that when they do their “holistic” review of an application, their goal is to “learn who you are, and what your passions are.” They get that mainly from the applicant’s essays, ECs, and teacher recs. A plain vanilla rec won’t be helpful in that process. But a teacher rec that singles out unique or unusual strengths and interests can be helpful if it’s consistent with what’s in the essays and ECs; it can help complete the portrait the adcom is looking for.</p>
<p>I’m personally against it, but I don’t see colleges stop accepting them. Students can just go for the same old trick: suck up to two to three teachers who will write the recs, and just be themselves in other classes (which is not a great thing most of the time, believe me. most suck-ups tend to be very different in other classes.).</p>
<p>I think a letter of “observation” may be a more accurate indication for colleges. Like a letter from a third person who has virtually no connection to the student aside from observing his traits, habits, etc. After all, when voting for a president, would you believe his fervent supporters or reports from credited analyzers? I would definitely go for the latter.</p>
<p>Of course, the idea above is just way too unrealistic and will never happen anyways. So we just have to bear with the system I guess.</p>
<p>^That is a very good idea you have above. I think an observation individual could be someone like a guidance counselor who has to write the letters for all of the students that ask for them, but the counselor could seek input from teachers though. That way, there would be a lot less bias in the style of the writing.</p>