<p>My first research summer was at a top-10 engineering school, and it lasted 3 months in the summer of 2010. Since October 2010 I have done research at the second best state school in my state with a professor. This summer I was a top-2 engineering school for research. And towards the end of last semester, I started preliminary study on a research project with a professor at my school. Basically, I can potentially get good-great recommendations from 3 professors from top schools (none of which are my school). Also, the professor from my school is the one I have done the least research with, but I feel like he knows me more; I have taken several classes with him since freshman year. Which three should I choose?</p>
<p>bump …</p>
<p>Drop whichever of three external professors you feel is weakest. You want at least one from your own school so that your academic performance is addressed, however obliquely.</p>
<p>A friend of mine applied to computer science programs with 4 external letters of recommendation (from 4 different universities, nonetheless) and that worked out well for her. Your mileage may vary.</p>
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<p>If some schools accept 4 you could use 4- though call the department- its not guaranteed that the admission committee will read the 4th letter- so I have been told.</p>
<p>@cosmicfish. Doesn’t your gpa in the classes provide them with a look at your academic performance?</p>
<p>bump…</p>
<p>@pyroknife. Yes, but only in the coursest possible terms. I’ve always been told (and have followed) that you want a letter that attests to what kind of student you are, and whether the professor thinks you can handle the academic load of grad school. There are students who get relatively poor grades while still learning the material very well, while there are others who get high grades by being good at “the system” without ever really learning or retaining the information. Grad programs want to know where you fall in this spectrum.</p>
<p>Also, just like a certain percentage of straight-A high school students flunk out of college (or least struggle badly), so too do a certain percentage of “highly qualified” grad students fail to keep up academically in grad school. Programs like to see that someone thinks you are able and prepared, beyond the numbers.</p>
<p>Regardless, I would not devote much time to this, I would just make sure that your LOR’s included one writer who taught a rigorous and relevant class in which you were active, engaged, and successful - ideally they can ALSO speak to research, but after the first 2 research LOR’s you are not really getting more value.</p>
<p>How about this - I have asked four people to write me LoRs, but for schools that only accept 3 letters, I can’t decide who is my weakest. Can you help me? In no particular order:</p>
<p>LoR #1 - undergrad professor - A in the class; field-related; but no research; told me he’ll say I love science, etc.
**LoR #2 ** - undergrad professor - A+ in the class - strongly field-related; but no research; told me he also uses one very strong sentence to get the point across. **LoR #3 ** - industry supervisor - R&D, did research for him
**LoR #4 ** - industry supervisor - lab work but not research</p>
<p>Obviously I always will use #3, but I can’t decide whether schools would prefer to see that #4 lab work or #1 and #2 academic professors. What combination should I go with?</p>
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<p>There you go! DWIC letters tend to be useless</p>
<p>So you’re saying #4 would be better than #1 or #2? Then of #1 and #2, who is better? </p>
<p>Also keep in mind my industry supervisors are NOT PhDs. In fact they are pretty much no names.</p>
<p>While I agree that “Did well in class” letters are pretty worthless (although most applicants have one), I would still go with letters 1 through 3 - “Did lab duties well” is not any better, especially coming from a non-PhD. If a letter is (a) not from a PhD and (b) reflects neither academic performance nor research experience, then I think it is of minimal value except as a backup unless there is something truly exceptional and relevant about the work performed. You don’t have any “great” writers here, they all have some significant strike against them, but in order from best to worst I would go 2-3-1-4.</p>
<p>Thank you a million times comicfish. I think I’ve said it before: I wish this forum had a “thank” function so for now, I hope you take joy in the fact that you made someone’s afternoon much better. :)</p>
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<p>@cosmicfish-</p>
<p>You are sooooo right. </p>
<p>My GPA sucked as an undergrad, but I knew the material/concepts of my classes, like math and chemistry. It’s just that I never studied for the tests. My brother was the same way. And he went on to get a doctorate at Berkeley.</p>
<p>The funny thing is we both tutored other undergrads in math and science, even though they had better grades than us. Heck, they even had better grades in the subjects we were tutoring them on…:)</p>
<p>I could never figure out how my lab partner, who had a high school GPA of 4.0 and college GPA of 3.7 not understand chemistry. I think most people are (as you said) good at working the system.</p>