Teacher recommendations for college?

mathmom
Tue, 09 Feb 2016 14:27:24 +0000

I think choosing the right teachers is one of the most difficult things to do, and it doesn’t help that you don’t know who the good vs mediocre writers are. We found out via earlier recommendations that my son’s orchestra teacher wrote the most generic of recommendations. We had not planned on any extra recommendations, but it was crystal clear that his would not be helpful! My older son had to get one STEM and one humanities/social science teacher for a recommendation and ended up using that pair for all his recommendations. In retrospect he might have been better off using two STEM teachers at some schools. While he got good grades in his non-STEM courses, it was clear he did the minimal work to get his A. He ended up using his Latin teacher which was the only non-STEM course he was enthusiastic about, and he’d had the teacher for four years in a row to boot.

My younger son chose his pre-calc teacher even though he’d only gotten a B+ in the course. The teacher wrote that even though his grades were less than perfect, he actually understood the mathematical thinking behind the concepts better than his fellow students who were better at memorizing formulas. Meanwhile the history teacher gave him practically a novel to write for his information before he’d write a letter. (Among the more interesting questions he asked students was what was their favorite text in APUSH and why.)

Anyway asking your GC if he/she knows who writes a good recommendation is a good idea. If you have friends in college from your school you could ask them. Be aware that some colleges (one at least!) won’t want two STEM teachers. And good luck.