<p>yeah seriously. One of my teachers said to one of my friends that he would be willing to write a recommendation for him, but to consider asking someone else because it will most likely not be great. Another one of my teachers wrote a negative letter of recommendation for some girl at my school a while back. The girl slept in his class everyday and almost failed. Don’t expect a teacher to rave about you. If you were such a stellar student, then the teacher will obviously reflect that in his/her recommendation, and if he/she doesn’t, then you’re at fault for choosing that person as your recommender.</p>
<p>@retrohippo – yes. exactly. thank you</p>
<p>One of my biggest insecurities regarding the app is the teacher rec…most students at my school don’t get to see their recs, and I’m just terrified of a negative one (like the one mentioned above). I’m not expecting great recs, but I don’t want disparaging ones.</p>
<p>Either way I guess it’s out of my control at this point.</p>
<p>It ultimately falls on the students though. You choose who to ask for a recommendation. So it’s up to you to consider who knows you best, who will write a good rec, etc. And it doesn’t matter how much time a teacher spends on a rec, that teacher is still taking time out of his/her extremely busy schedule to do you a favor. If you think about it the teacher who only has half an hour to write one will write one that means a lot more than the teacher who has endless time, because that teacher is sacrificing a lot more to write it. If the rest of your application is good, then you shouldn’t be worrying about a teacher rec.</p>
<p>I didn’t mean to come across as ungrateful. I guess the vagaries of the application process have just left me a bit antsy :/</p>
<p>To be sure, and I agree that if a student has a poor recommendation that is certainly their fault. I’m more talking about the difference between a very good recommendation and a killer rec (and at a place like Yale that difference can be key). You have to imagine that the same bright, motivated, meritorious student would have different-- at least slightly different-- recommendations were he at any other school than the one he is at. My belief is that too much of this difference is left up to chance (chance upon teacher’s writing ability, experience writing recs, amount of time available, etc) than should be for it to be the primary differentiator among similar college applicants.</p>
<p>And you can’t deny that a teacher who spends an hour or two on a rec will write a better one, all else being equal, than one who can spend just 30 min, if for no other reason than the greater extent of proofreading and reworking.</p>
<p>Not only the teacher recs are left to chance…also your interview, your counselor, your location, your race, …these all are factors in a mysterious subjective evaluation process we will probably never fully understand…</p>
<p>@Happy2102 Aww yiss I got something right haha xD</p>
<p>Yeah that’s valid. I’d say that of everything, grades/accomplishments within context of school, standardized testing, and (most of all) essays aren’t left to chance, so I’d think that the process should start with these, and then move on to the more chancey stuff.</p>
<p>haha so i take it that you don’t believe in affirmative action?</p>
<p>Guys let’s not start talking about aa. Let’s keep this a happy thread.</p>
<p>I don’t see how that can even be construed as ungrateful complaining. They are simply pointing out that some students have access to teachers who write better recommendations (regardless of how close the applicant is to said teacher), and since recommendations are such a large factor in the admissions process this would seem to be advantageous to students who have access to better recommendation writers. </p>
<p>Here’s an example. One of my friends asked my French teacher to write his recommendation. He is one of her favorite students and does exemplary work, and she did her best to write a recommendation, but she simply isn’t a talented writer. She asked me several times for advice on what to say, and since he is a four year student of hers I expected it to be at least decent. When she read it to me though it seemed like she had just sort of listed his EC’s and called him bright. You might say, “Ask someone else,” but in a school like mine where the teaching quality isn’t the best, there really aren’t any better options. </p>
<p>Compare this to an elite college prep school where all of the teachers are some of the best in their respective fields, and many are excellent writers. A student at a school such as this could ask a teacher he or she had only had for a year and get a recommendation far beyond what any of the teachers at my school are capable of. </p>
<p>I don’t believe the above posters were at all disappointed in their teachers, but instead felt that the system is unfair because of what I have outlined here.</p>
<p>lol i know so many people have pointed this out already i just felt like putting it in my own words for the sake of writing/not losing my sanity over decisions and impending due dates</p>
<p>edit: so that means I dont want to argue, only to type words for you to ignore</p>
<p>Another reason on why you shouldn’t ask to see your recommendations. 
Believe me, if you are not accepted I doubt it will be because of the poorly written or generic recommendations.</p>
<p>yes it’s true that not all teacher recs are as good as others simply because of unavoidable circumstances, but worrying/complaining about it isn’t going to change anything. as people have said, it’s mostly chance.
take me for instance. i am fairly confident that both of my teachers wrote extremely good recommendations. but i didn’t get called for an interview. now I could stress about this, worry 24/7, whine about the fact that it’s unfair that not everyone gets an interview and that some interviewers are nicer/better than others. but NOTHING WOULD CHANGE. my stress isn’t going to change my admissions decision. stressing will only hurt me in the end. and i can acknowledge that if i don’t get into yale, it won’t be the end of the world. to some extent, it’s just luck. My brother got rejected from Yale when he applied SCEA, but then got accepted to Princeton, UPenn, and Columbia. I did all I could, and that’s all I can ask for. We all just need to calm down a little.</p>
<p>Interviews are another area that will have little or no affect on your acceptance.</p>
<p>Just coming in to add my two cents:
Brenzel says “Students, when we’re on the road, we often play a little kind of quiz show game with students, asking what they think is the most important part of the application. Many, many students respond, “Well, the testing must be the most important.” It’s actually one of the less important elements in the file. The testing can give you a sense of what schools are within your range, and it gives the school a sense of what students in the applicant pool are within their range. The most important part of your application — bar none, no question, any college — is your high school transcript. Probably the next most important are your teacher recommendations, particularly if you’re applying to any kind of selective college or university.”</p>
<p>So, recommendations, in the end (if it really comes down to it) can make the difference between an acceptance, deferral, or rejection. I understand it may be unfair, but right now, that’s just the way it is. Interpreting Brenzel’s little quote here, we can see that recommendations are even more important than essays (though by how much, I’m not willing to guess). </p>
<p>On a second note, I think that teacher’s do us a favor when they write recommendations. They certainly don’t have to. When I went up to my AP Bio teacher and asked her to write me one, she could’ve said no, but she didn’t. It’s ultimately their choice and their time; it’s not a part of their job description.</p>
<p>I was out at dinner and creeping on this thread, guys. My life has officially lost all meaning.</p>
<p>Here is what Yale deems important. Recommendations are important but only if you are talking about a poor or good one, not whether it was written poorly or generically.</p>
<p>Rigor of secondary school record
Class rank
Academic GPA
Standardized test scores
Application Essay
Recommendation</p>
<p>Nonacademic
Extracurricular activities
Talent/ability
Character/personal qualities</p>
<p>IMHO, your essays are WAY more important than the quality of your recommendations.</p>
<p>The content of a recommendation says a lot. It’s how a professional views a certain student. An essay is more of how an applicant views him or herself. So, IMHO, recommendations and essays are weighted about equally, not with one higher than the other.</p>
<p>Adcom clearly recognizes everything you guys have pointed out about variation in teacher recs. It’s not to hard to tell when a letter is more of a reflection on the teacher than on the student. In these cases, I’d assume that the interview and essays take more weight. Adcom isn’t stupid-- they’ve been at this admissions process a lot longer than any of us.</p>