Recommendation LettersAnswered
Hello,
Quick question, i'm a rising senior and I was curious if your recommendation letters for applying to college HAVE to be from teachers at school, or if you can get them from other people in the community (ie. something who has mentored me) because I feel the latter would be far more effective not only because they are more qualified in the field I hope the pursue, but they know me better on a personal level.
Thanks!
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2 answers
Hi, thank you for asking your question! For most schools you can submit as many as 4 letters of recommendation -- however, we do not generally recommend this. We recommend submitting between 1-3 to the schools you are applying to. Firstly, your guidance counselor by default will be writing one of your letters of recommendation. The remaining two, should you choose to include them, can be from teachers or external mentors, bosses, team leaders, coaches, etc (basically anyone you've made a genuine connection with that will impress admissions officers). If you are choosing a teacher, I would suggest including a teacher that knows you really well, ideally this can be in your area of interest.
Here is a blog post that provides more information on this as well as a livestream, if you prefer to passively watch instead:
https://blog.collegevine.com/how-important-are-letters-of-recommendation/
https://www.collegevine.com/livestreams/4018/how-to-ask-for-a-letter-of-recommendation-with-yesh
Hope this helps!
You have to look at the requirements of the schools you are applying too. Most schools want recommendations from teachers (which is sometimes even more specified to particular subjects they teach like they might want a STEM teacher and Humanities teacher idk) but will offer you the opportunity to get additional recommendations from other people like your boss or in your case, your mentor.
I hope this helped, but if not hopefully someone else provides a better answer.
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Thank you for the reply