In a typical application, there are two groups of submissions: academic and personal.
In the academic side, we have the standardized testing, transcript, multimedia sometimes, and teacher recommendations. On the personal side, we have essays, interviews, and maybe the character skills snapshot?
Everyone knows that it’s a holistic process and admissions officers are going to look at everything before making a decision, but how do you think the different aspects of an application rank?
I vaguely remember an AO telling me that academically, teacher recommendations were the most important, but I’m not sure if that’s the case across the board. I would also think that the character skills snapshot would be less significant than essays and interviews and essays maybe more significant than interviews. I’m curious what you think!
I’d agree with the AO. Private schools would rather have students who are interested in learning than students who are disruptive or don’t do their work. The teacher recommendations will carry a lot of weight. It’s not a matter of ticking off one box, you have to tick them all off.
The concern some applicants have with the recommendation letters being heavily weighted is that the teachers barely know them, especially this year. And you are required to use rec’s from current math and English teachers.
It’s a GIVEN for many of the posters here that they do their schoolwork and aren’t behavioral problems.
BUT if you are an applicant from a large public middle school (say, > 400 per grade), it’s likely that no matter how off the charts fantastic a student you are, unless you are a teacher’s kid or Mom’s active in the PTO, you are an unknown to the teachers and administration. At least in my district. Even if you are a straight A+ student. Heck, the administration at my kid’s school last year recognized the wrong student as president of NGHS in the moving up ceremony and no one noticed; the principal was shocked when I pointed out the error.
If the student is participating in their classes, they will be known to the teachers. If the student isn’t participating in their classes, the teacher can’t write about that.
Administration is generally not writing the reference letters. If there is one required from administration, they’ll get the info from the student’s teachers.
I don’t see what being a teacher’s kid or mom being active in the PTA has to do with teachers knowing a student’s performance in class. I think you’re conflating parents being known to teachers and administration with students being known to teachers and administration.
In my district, connections count more than scores and grades. After grade 4, every year is treated as a blank slate, your reputation as a good student does not follow you, you have to prove yourself from scratch. Unless, of course, you have those connections.
(Mark Twain had a point in his observations about Boston versus New York.)
This year especially, depending on where you go to school, you might have had very little class time in person before asking for rec’s.
^. And don’t forget having older sibs that the teachers remember.
The whole reason why some moms do PTA is so that their families are known to the admin and teachers. It is Lord of the Flies out there.
When kiddo knew he was applying, he made an extra effort to get to know his public school teachers, otherwise they wouldn’t know him. These overworked teachers have 6 periods of 25+ kids. They aren’t giving meaty assignments because they don’t have the time to read and grade them. By the time they write recs they have had maybe 12 weeks with your child’s class, these days via zoom. It is unrealistic to expect a public school teacher in our district to know a kid well enough to write anything deep in a rec.
Kiddo was lucky enough to have a great math teacher that year who let him hang out with her after school once a week and was supportive of him teaching himself geometry (not offered by school) and applying to bs. She gave him a textbook and helped him if he had questions. But if he had the teacher from the year before, he would have been sunk.
Epilogue: according to a mom I just spoke to, the great math teacher is not great at distance teaching - she can’t keep up with the avalanche of emails she gets and doesn’t get to know the students.
Sorry for the long post. Point is, public school kids are probably at a disadvantage if recommendations are weighted heavily.
Just a note to add that at least some schools this year are allowing “last year’s” teachers to submit the recommendations for just this reason. I’d check with the AOs to make sure of course.
Yeah, I’m having this specific issue that you’re talking about. My teacher teaches a lot of kids online and barely know me even though I am a straight A+ student. Yeah we’re 400 students per grade type of public school. I’m quite worried on the recommendation letter part. Anyone has any suggestions?
If they have office hours, maybe go to those? That’s what I’ve been doing. Or email them asking them a question or with something funny related to the subject they teach, like a meme. I feel like that might be a good way to form a stronger relationship between you and your teacher. And I think one thing to keep in mind is that everyone else is going through something similar as well, so even if your recommendation isn’t the most exceptional, don’t think you’d be alone.
The AOs do know that there are differences between public and private schools.
I know in my parent interview at one school, the AO commented that the SSAT scores are viewed differently depending on where the applicant went to school. So, for example, a 70th percentile math score would not be a red flag for a public school high honors (all A+) student taking the highest level courses their school offered, but would be a red flag for a student from a place like Belmont Day School, where students have SSAT prep, etc.
I would suspect that the same is the case for teacher rec’s. If you’re coming from a public school that’s Title 1 and/or in an area where independent schools are a foreign/exotic concept, this may be taken into account. Especially this year, where letters are likely to be… terse.
One thing I would suggest is to take advantage of the option of a supplemental letter of rec. , someone who knows you well enough to say something meaningful. This can be school teacher, a private teacher, a coach, a GSUSA or BSA leader, or even, depending on the school and your faith tradition, a religious educator - basically, anyone who knows you well that can highlight aspects that you want to emphasize.
If you’ve been dancing for 10 years… hit up your dance teacher.
If you’ve been 1st chair in the orchestra… hit up the orchestra teacher.
It does not matter that you are not interested in becoming a professional dancer or musician. It does matter that someone can say you’re a 3 dimensional person that they like having around. You don’t have to be a soloist - schools need team players and leaders too.
This is a helpful, and reading between the lines, what you’re really saying is that they are grading everyone on a curve based on their school, and looking for outliers.
Could I further follow up on the question of recommendation letters after reading stalecookies very helpful comments:
What would fit in the Special Interest recommendation? I know if you’re in a soccer team and you want to play in the schools’ soccer team, that obviously makes sense to put your soccer coach’s recommendation in the Special interest category. But what if it is a special interest like painting - there is no team to join, could I put recommendation of my art or music teacher who taught me since I was tiny in the Special Interest category or should that be in the Personal category? or maybe one could be put in the Special Interest and the other in the Personal?
Thank you so much for any advice you have on this!