What are the preferred teachers to write recommendation letters?

Applying to College
1

I saw comments somewhere saying English and Math teachers are the preferred teachers. My daughter goes to a public school, her 11th grade English teacher (AP Lang) only writes letters for 20 people and she was not able to get it. She is planning to ask her French teacher to write one. Will this hurt her application?
I heard that it is much easier to get what you want in private schools. For public schools that have hundreds of students and low teacher/student ratio, this is a huge disadvantage. Do colleges consider this?

2

I would disagree with this. Unless the college has specific requirements, any teacher of a core subject, preferably from 11th or 12th grade, is fine. She should choose teachers who know her and like her, not necessarily ones that give easy As. Although choosing at least one teacher that’s taught her in an area aligned to her potential major is a good idea.

I’m not sure that’s necessarily true. Students (and GCs) know which teachers are the in-demand ones for college recs. That holds true in most schools. And even in private schools, teachers may limit how many recs they will write.

3

Public school isn’t about “getting what you want”. But I hope you and your DD get what you need. :wink:

Unless the school district makes some kind of provision for the time it takes teachers to write recommendations (i.e. entitling them to a sub for a few days between October and December), a personal limit of 20 actual sounds reasonable.

4

If the French teacher knows your D well enough to speak about her positive traits academically and personally she is just fine. Keep in mind that colleges are not interested in the credentials of the recommender, they are interested in learning about the applicant.

5

Top criterion: Teacher likes you a lot and knows you well
Other criteria:
11th or 12th grade teacher
one STEM and one not
subject relating to your potential major (if you have one)
experienced and knowledgable about how good rec letters work

6

We are in a small district, and the foreign language teachers are very popular for LORs because often they have had the student for all 4 years. Admissions counselors do get the school profile, so I do think it would be taken into account that large public schools it may be harder for a student to get a super personal LOR.