FREAKING OUT!!!Answered
So my principal from secondary school wrote my counselor recommendation. We don't have a counselor.
All she wrote was...
Meggy attended X high school from - year to - year. She participated in all religious, extracurricular, and academic activities in the school. I strongly recommend you admit her.
She printed it out and gave me. She didn't agree to submit it herself.
I am freaking out. Is that how the counselor rec is meant to be? I GAVE A FORMAT AND CONTENT GUIDELINES AND EVEN an example letter. She is also my academic guardian and she has known me personally for my six years in the school. I also wrote an essay on all my achievements and EVERYTHING.
Will her letter affect my application? What do I do? I'm super scared and literally panicking right now.
#Internationalstudent
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2 answers
Since she gave you the recommendation, that already violated the policies of how to submit a recommendation. Since it was such a poorly written recommendation, I think she did you a great favor by handing it to you. You DO NOT want to submit something so poorly written to begin with.
Therefore, please have someone in your High School administration who knows you better write the reommendation. It could be the head of school or Principal or the staff who works in adminstration who has access to your records. This time, explain to them that you need them to spend at least an hour on this so that colleges can learn something useful that is not on the college application about your personality, your character, citing examples that they have personally witnessed about how you conduct yourself.
I hope this is helpful. Good luck
(AND DO NOT ALLOW THEM TO GIVE YOU A COPY). Use the Common App method as decribed in their instructions.
This also happens to me. I'm an international student and we have a different education system, and my counselor can't get the point how she can write the recommendation letter.
In my case, I sent her an example and list of what she had to write. I gave her my biography and what I want her to write in the rec letter. Fortunately, she was able to write it in our language which is okay because we can translate it. I also asked her to attach it in the application form and guided her through a zoom meeting.
However, this is not in your case. Firstly, I don't know how did you ask your counselor, did you meet her in person? Did she agree to write your rec letter? Even if you gave her the example, did you write the points what she have to write like your achievements or your characteristics? Because some of counselor don't know who you are, you have to show them.
If you have done all of it, consider to ask your rec letter from your headmaster. Some students don't have counselor and they ask their headmaster to write them a rec letter. It's quite intimidating but it's better than a boring rec letter, right?
If you can't ask your headmaster, the last way to solve this problem is to write your own rec letter and ask her to sign it. My friend does this. I don't recommend you to do this in the US colleges because you have waived your right to read your rec letter, but if it's impossible to get a rec letter from your counselor and/or headmaster, you can try this. Then, you can make a new e-mail to attach the rec letter to your application.
I hope it helps!
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I would have really loved to do that, but my school charges a huge fee per recommendation letter. Which is already cruel and unfair already. But I'll try to find someone. Thank you by the way.