<p>So one of my teachers from Junior year is writing my letter of recommendation for college. It is my AP World teacher and I received an A+ in his class, a 5 on the exam, and I took home the Best Delegate award from the regional Model UN conference for that year at (major Boston-based University) - I believed myself to be more or less the epitome of an AP World student. </p>
<p>My teacher bragged about me to his other classes, other history teachers, other teachers in general, etc - people regarded me as one of his clear “favorites” - so I thought that asking him for a letter of recommendation would be obvious, especially since my intended major is International Relations/Political Science.</p>
<p>However, I’ve visited him about 6 times thus so far after school, just to ask him questions, give him brag sheets, etc. Literally half of the time, he’s super excited to see me - on one instance, another teacher was in the room and he went on this tangent about how I was a “world history stud” and that it was unfortunate that the other teacher couldn’t get me as a student. The other three times I went to go see him, he seemed super annoyed with me, like he was both confused and bothered by the fact that I went to go see him.</p>
<p>I’m worried that his moodiness is going to reflect poorly in the recommendation that he writes for me. I don’t know what I could have done to upset him or annoy him on those occasions but yeah.</p>
<p>I was wondering if getting him a thank you gift/card or whatever early could maybe alleviate his occasional disgruntlement at me.</p>
<p>It might not be you.</p>
<p>High school teachers, especially public school teachers, often have huge workloads. Those times that he seems annoyed with you might not be due to your actions. He could simply be overworked or stressed. I’m sure he genuinely likes you, and I’m equally sure that he’ll do his best on your letter of rec. </p>
<p>Just remember that our teachers are just as busy, if not more so, as us :)</p>
<p>weird I am in the exact same situation…my favorite teacher who wrote me a rec all of a sudden seemed very passive and irritated when he saw me…it really bugged me but I assume it has nothing to do with me, I’m sure it’s the same in your case</p>
<p>The other thing is not to be too pushy with your recs, especially if there’s a bunch of stuff you need to give to your teacher. Make sure to get all your documents and forms together, and give it to the teacher in one package. You want to make this process as painless as possible for your teacher.</p>
<p>Don’t go to his room every other day to check up on the letter. Unless the due date is within a week, you should let your teacher do his/her own thing with the letter. If you aren’t too pushy, and give them space to do the letter, they’ll know that you trust them, and will be that much more positive in their letter.</p>
<p>Basically what happened was, the first few times I went to go see him were for stuff unrelated to the letter - he nominated me for a scholarship and I went to go thank him. Another time, I had to borrow a book for the SAT subject test in his room - etc. He was happy to see me.</p>
<p>The third time, I brought him basically everything in one set - including the brag sheet and the list of colleges with deadlines. He was slightly less happy, but he was still like “thanks, this is awesome.”</p>
<p>The first time I reminded him was yesterday after school - because my deadline is 11 days. He seemed genuinely bothered. I felt bad, I didn’t mean to rush him. He has a lot of letters to do, I didn’t want him to confuse my deadline with someone else or whatever.</p>
<p>In that case, you’re doing nothing wrong. Just remember to thank him (SINCERELY) after every time you see him. Remind him if you need to, but keep it to, at maximum, once every two days.</p>