DS25 attends a large, urban public high school with one guidance counselor per grade. Their guidance counselor stays with them for all four years, but each one manages 350+ kids. Well, their guidance counselor just emailed the class that she isn’t returning for the fall and wished them luck. Since so many schools require guidance counselor recs, DS is applying ED1 to one school and EA to a bunch of others, this puts us in a bit of a bind. Do we write up a really comprehensive brag sheet for their replacement and hope for the best? Do we mention this in the Additional Info section?
Adding that the school sends MOST kids to CC, city public schools, and art schools. DS is in a small group of higher performing kids that are aiming for LACs and T50.
I would suggest you contact the both the school principal AND the head of guidance. If you email, include both as recipients, because you are more likely to get a response if you do. Give them a few days to respond. If they don’t, escalate to the Board of Education!
You need to know who will be hand’ing the guidance needs of these seniors!
Our school asks everyone for a brag sheet. It includes questions for the parent to fill out as well. Does your school have one? If not, maybe the collective on this site can share some of the questions that their schools ask.
Is your son top of his class? Did he take what would be considered a rigorous or the most rigorous course schedule?
He took the maximum allowable number of APs each year and a college level course this past year. His school doesn’t rank. The school gave out a basic brag sheet, but should we add on more info beyond the ECs and what they want to study in college?
I would suggest that the brag sheet be concise…especially if some new GC is going to need to read 300 plus of them. Include what is on the sheet, and any things that are being done outside of school because the GCs have no way of knowing those things.
When I went on college tours with D19, a few of the colleges mentioned that they don’t place a lot of significance in counselor recs from large schools as they understand it’s usually very difficult for the counselor to actually know the students, and they would place more emphasis on the letters from the teachers. Definitely think you should follow up as others have mentioned, but it may not be a major issue anyway.
This is reassuring!
If most kids are attending CC, the counselor doesn’t need to write letters for them. City public schools might not require letters either. How may kids apply ED? Your son’s letter may be one of the first that this counselor writes.
Your student gets one chance for ED. Personally, I would make the effort to educate the new counselor as much as possible. While it might not be as important as other parts in the application, it is still part of the application and is read.
I would schedule a meeting with the new counselor. Your student should do most of the talking, but have notes of things that you feel are important.
Yes, do a brag sheet. Anticipate that language might be lifted directly from the brag sheet and included in the rec letter. At my kids’ two different high schools, among other things, the brag sheet asks student - and parents - for a short list of adjectives describing the student along with supporting anecdotes.
Beyond the brag sheet, I wouldn’t worry about the counselor rec. At both a larger private and small public, my kids’ college counselors did not know them outside of one meeting to talk about college lists and the application process.
Yes and this is not a huge deal. Many kids have Continued counselors with even more students and they don’t know the kids at all and I’m sure the counselor report is more for profile in these cases.
I’m sure it won’t impact at all - the teacher reqs will show more than enough.
This is the case for S24. He attended a very large public high school, with over 800 kids in his class. His counselor just wrote out general LOR and sent out transcript if request. Nothing else in college application process. The actual LOR used in common apps and scholarship were from his teachers and coaches.
Regarding college research and financial aid info, he attended school seminar and researched on his own. He ended up in T50, no worry 
The guidance counselor’s additions included an explanation of the available coursework, the grading system, how rigorous the student’s schedule was, and an explanation of the demands of that particular student’s ECs, which might not have been obvious. Most importantly, our GC wrote about a very difficult family illness situation which our child had navigated without a drop in grades, thus freeing him up to not discuss it himself in his applications.
So if there’s anything that you want the GC to write about, let them know. Their letter can be a lot more than just a list of the activities that the kid already listed.
As others have said, at many large public schools the GCs don’t know the kids. My oldest didn’t have a GC hired until 10/1 of her Senior year. It made me extremely nervous but somehow the GC got her rec in by the 11/1 deadline needed for her EA schools. I am sure the rec was very generic but we relied on the teacher recommendations being more personalized and carrying the day. The same GC wrote a rec for D24 who she also had never met. Both girls got into great schools. It will be fine.
This is frustrating; however, you don’t need to worry about the counselor’s LOR. It’s more likely a confirmation of “yes this is a good kid”. I’m a high school teacher. Our counselors have a set of “templates” for LOR. Unless the student has serious disciplinary actions documented (beyond suspensions), there’s almost nothing worth noting (not a direct quote from one counselor but very close).
However, please do prepare a clear and straightforward brag sheet. Depending on how well the new counselor works with college-bound students, it’s worth standing out, especially if the counselors are getting updated on local scholarships. When the counselor receives these updates from the district or sponsors, you want them to think of your kid.
Our twins went to a similar kind of high school, graduating this year. There are strong students there but many have no intention of going to any kind of college at all. It is an “under-performing” school because a large proportion of the student body doesn’t even bother to show up for state standardized tests.
Our kids were and are academically ambitious. We were advised (by a pro bono college counsellor we worked with who volunteered at the local public library) to schedule a meeting with the high school guidance counsellor—just us parents.
We were very glad we did. The guy was happy to meet with us—not for long, about ten minutes. We just chatted about our kids’ plans, courses, etc. It was a way of supplementing the brag sheets.
After that meeting, we’d run into the counsellor at events—he was always happy to see us. A lot of what keeps him busy are problems that have nothing to do with our kids. But he liked the part of his job that put him in contact with high achievers, too.
When our kids both got into a selective school, he was very pleased, emailing us with congratulations, etc.
So the moral of our story is that even at a difficult, very big public school, guidance counsellors like to help, and like face-to-face contact, as long as it’s not overdone. (I suppose personalities differ, though.) A little in-person time goes a long way.
I am so sorry this is happening to you. It is stressful and it stinks that because of the way it is set up, one person leaving (for whatever reason) can cause chaos and lots of unknowns.
That being said, OA’s read so many applications and know that not all GCs are created equal. They can see the difference between GCs that really know a kid and are writing information that is meaningful and GC’s that see 350+ kids and do a cut and paste. In a holistic review, an impersonal “meh” document from your GC is not going to harm you.
Also, it never hurts to get to know the AO at schools you are interested in. You can always introduce yourself, explain the situation and ask what they advise. They probably won’t advise anything and tell you not to worry, but it will put the situation on their radar.
If anyone knows, to what extent might there be admission value in this inclusion in the counselor rec? Can’t hurt, adds context, anything else?
Likely depends on the school - some none, others some level of consideration, likely minimal, but depends on the extent and involvement of the student.
In the age of “holistic” admissions, the kid who maintains top grades and ECs while dealing with homelessness, or a family member’s serious illness, or a family member’s incarceration, or some other tremendous challenge, certainly comes to the attention of the admissions committee. Having the guidance counselor mention this in their cover letter serves two purposes: it allows the applicant to use their space to focus on the positive, on their achievements, on their future, and it avoids the victim narrative, while still informing the college of the adverse circumstances.
Agree with this advice. Write a concise but comprehensive list of your kiddo’s accomplishments in and out of school, their personal and academic goals, honors and awards they have won, etc. Is the new incoming counselor new to the school or will they be familiar with the school and teachers? Because I’d also, in addition to setting up a meeting with you, your kiddo and the new counselor (so they can get a clear idea of who your kiddo is, a flavor for their personality and start a working relationship/connection if needed), your kiddo can also suggest some of his teachers that he’s had a good relationship with, so the new GC can ask them about your kid from their perspective. Good luck!