I’m going to be a senior this year, so naturally I have started a lot of my college applications. I am applying to 10 common app schools and 2 non-common app schools. I am new to this process so I am kind of confused how the teacher recommendations work. For the Common app schools, do the teachers you invite have to fill out a separate recommendation for EACH school you assign them to, or do they fill out just one recommendation that gets saved on file or something and then that recommendation gets sent to each school you are applying to? I’m just wondering because I am asking four of my teachers for recommendations and I just would feel bad if they each had to fill out so many letters since I am applying to so many schools.
In my school we had a program called naviance; two teachers (and the counselor) would upload ONE letter of recc, and this would then be uploaded to the common app (both websites were linked to each other with an email address). Then that would be that–each school receives the same letters of recc usually, most students choose two teachers for all their schools. Ask your guidance counselor how it works in your school though.
One letter of recommendation per teacher that is send to multiple schools. There is no need for them to send to multiple schools.
It’s a question you’ll need to ask your guidance counselor; each school does it a bit differently.
In my school, each kid asks 3 teachers for letters. The College Placement office takes those 3 requests and tries to spread them out a bit so that certain teachers are less overwhelmed. (Several years I’ve had close to 40 letters to write. It’s hard to make each sound special when there are so many.)
We submit them electronically to Naviance, and hand in a hard copy to the office… by the end of the school year in June for that year’s Juniors.
So the kids in the class of 2016 have 2 letters on file already, in addition to the ones that will be written this year by their guidance counselors. College placement takes over at this point. Aside from the questions on the Common App I have to answer, that is, but I can’t do that until it goes active on August 1.
Usually you ask two teachers and it’s the same letter that goes to all schools. Our HS uses Naviance as well, so the teachers write the letters and give them to the GC and it is uploaded through Naviance.
If your school doesn’t use Naviance, then you can invite teachers through the Common App. But check with your guidance office for instructions on how your school wants you to go about this.