Recently one of my teachers gave me his letter of recommendation for me. I'm applying to a lot of top notch colleges, and I was wondering, for those of you who had the privilege to read your teachers' letters -- did they tell the truth, or embellish about you? It'd be my guess that most would make you sound better than you are, after all, they want the school to have more students who go to better colleges. For the Common Application section, did your teachers fill out "One of the top few encountered in my career" or lower? This is a little anal, but I'm just wondering if my teacher is doing things differently because he likes to be totally honest. I'm a little scared it could ruin my chances of getting into the really competitive colleges just because they don't know he's taking every flaw into account, which other teachers might rarely do.
Also -- I'm really interested to hear from anyone who got accepted into Yale, Princeton, Stanford, or Harvard. Any tips on essays would be really appreciated.
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Teachers are generally honest about who you are as a student, whether you like it or not. Typically that is why you choose a class you did well in and that the teacher liked you during. We dont get to see our recommendations at our school though, they are kept confidential I believe, sent separately with our transcript.
-Dan
No matter what they write you are going to doubt.
Whether it was negative or positive you are probably going to wonder whether they stretched the truth, or flat out lied. Just trust them, you did choose them to write it for you, and if it really is a problem just nicely talk to them about it.
My experience in seeing the ones written for me and for others is that they embellish it a little. It isn't over the top, but it seems to be a little above who the person actually is in life. When colleges look over those though they take them with a grain of salt because they know teachers embellish or even make students look worse than they are sometimes.
Teachers try their best to make you sound better. If they really liked you then they'll see you in such a positive light and if they thought you slacked, well I don't think they are going to write that. Usually its best to give them an option so they can give you an excuse without feeling guilty. My freshman teacher was bombarded with recommendations and she doesn't even remember some of them.
It doesn't really matter how glowing the recommendation is, just pick a teacher you know because if you do that they'll be sure to make it sound true and down-to-heart. If they didn't know you that well then their letter may be glowing but admission could probably see it as fake. My cousin went to Harvard and the teachers she got to recommend her were ones that she was really close to. Her club advisor (since she was president), her favorite math teacher (She was his teacher assistant), and the person in charge of the ESL (because she was one of the aids). She picked well and its clear because she got into a good college.
I asked one of my instructors to write a letter of recommendation for me for one of my college's scholarship and he totally told the truth because he wrote things like he really enjoyed having me as a student.
good luck!!!!!!
okay, personal experience from a poor girl who got accepted at Upenn- i guess that one's not considered "top notch"-
my teacher who i asked for a recommendation totally backed up his opinions by actual incidents that took place during my time as his student so he could give an honest judgment of me as a student. but yeah- i wished he hadn't written such a nice one and then hadn't encouraged me to go
i'm actually happy to be out- i transferred but i think its totally because i could not relate with and understand the culture there
but yeah- Recommendations- i like teachers to be truthful and objective with a little of bias they can support
that's my opinion- but really i think it is all different teacher to teacher
"Pride is concerned with who is right. Humility is concerned with what is right."