Rec Letters

Recommendation letters tend to create a lot of stress, headaches, and confusion for students, but the anxiety and drama over rec letters is not necessary!

Personally, one of my absolute FAVORITE parts of my job is the time that I get to spend sitting down, one on one, with each of my students to talk about your entire high school experience as a whole and listening to the stories you share when I am "interviewing" you to get information to write your recommendation letter. I find your stories fascinating, your insight remarkable, and quite often your humor to be very entertaining. Of course, I will also admit that the excitement goes away pretty quick when you walk out the door and I am left with pages full of notes and the actual letters to write. (Talking = Very Happy... Writing = Not so much...)

While the seniors are certainly the students who are more focused on the need for recommendation letters, it is also a great reminder of why it is important for students of every grade level (Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior) to drop by my office throughout the year to allow me to get to know you better. I sincerely want to hear about the things you are involved in and are accomplishing during high school. Plus, I am pretty good at saving random tidbits of information that I see or learn about you that might help me "someday" when I need to write your recommendation.

For the seniors, have you started looking at your college applications to see if they require recommendation letters from me or from your teachers? Some schools will require it and some will not. OSU, for example, does NOT require any recommendation letters. (Can you blame them? Imagine trying to read 22,000 recommendation letters on top of the applications and essays that they receive.) Miami University, on the other hand, will require a rec letter from a teacher or from me. If you are having problems determining if the colleges you are considering require recommendation letters – just stop down to see me and I can try to help you figure it out.

If you do need recommendation letters, give some thought ahead of time to who you would like to ask for the recommendations. Look at the requirements specified by the school – are they open to coaches or advisors writing letters or do they want them to come from academic teachers? If it requires that the letters come from teachers, can it be from any subject area or are they only looking for the core subjects of English, math, science, and social studies? Are you looking at a career in a specific area that a teacher at WKHS can write about your strengths in that field? For example, if you are considering majoring in Spanish perhaps a recommendation letter from one of your Spanish teachers would be appropriate. What teachers know you best? Who can speak to your work ethic and classroom contributions? If you need multiple teacher recommendations, when possible it is ideal to show your strengths across multiple subjects, so if you have a few teachers to pick from and 2 are math and 1 is science perhaps it would be beneficial to ask 1 math and 1 science teacher rather than the 2 math teachers simply to show that diversity. Remember, in recommendation letters from teachers, the colleges are asking for information about you as a student and your potential for handling the academic rigors of college.

Once you have figured out the teacher or teachers that you want to ask for a recommendation (if needed) it is then time to ASK them if they are willing to write a letter for you. It is really important to be reasonable in the amount of time that you are allowing them to have to write your letter. (Think 30 days or more!) They are very busy with their classroom work and grading homework and papers and of course life in general and many teachers are often bombarded by students requesting recommendations. If a teacher is unable to write a recommendation letter for you – either because they don’t feel that they know you well enough to write a strong letter or because they have too much on their plate, don’t take it personally, simply ask another teacher. You will be thankful that you didn’t force them to write the letter because it wouldn’t be as solid of a recommendation letter if they were rushed or only had vague highlights to discuss. If you are applying to schools that do not need teacher recommendation letters, please do not waste your teacher's time by asking them to write a letter. Also, only ask the number of teachers that you need recommendations from - so if you are applying to two schools and both need 1 teacher recommendation letter, just ask one teacher to write a letter that will be used for both schools. You do not need to ask for more letters in case one is "better" than another - if you are not sure the teacher will write a positive letter for you, then you need to pick someone else. If you trust the teacher enough to ask them to write the letter, then you should trust them enough to be able to send their letter (without seeing it) to the college.

In the Counseling and Career Center and on PrepHQ in the Shared Files area we have a form you can use to ask your teachers to write a recommendation for you. It is also helpful to provide a resume or the type of information which is frequently seen on a resume to your teachers. (To make this easier, if you don’t have a resume, there is a recommendation information sheet on the back of the recommendation request form just mentioned.) It is also really important to specify the number of letters that you need, for which schools, and to provide envelopes as well as any forms required by the schools for the teachers to complete. (For example, the common application has a 2 page form for the teachers in addition to their recommendation letter. If your teacher is not completing their common app recommendation electronically then you need to print this form and give it to your teacher.)

Once your teacher has completed his/ her recommendation letter they will either give it directly to me to add into your application packet when we mail it or they will give it to you to bring to me. You are the one ultimately responsible for making sure that the recommendation letter is submitted to me, so if you are unsure if your teacher has provided me with the letter, stop down to see me.

If a counselor recommendation is required it is beneficial to come and see me as soon as you realize it so that we can set up a time to meet. (Yes, I do require EVERY student that I am going to write a recommendation letter for to actually come in and TALK to me… but the good news is that I do NOT make you write out the short answer essays!) I write the letters on a first come first serve basis. It is the only way I know how to be fair. Writing recommendation letters is a very time consuming process taking multiple hours per letter which adds up quickly. So please, watch your deadlines and try to help me write the best letter possible by allowing me to have plenty of time. The reason recommendation letters take so long is that each letter should (hopefully) capture the essence of you – and each of you are very different. Remember, when writing recommendation letters generalized praise is wasted space so I need stories and examples to help give admissions officers a better understanding of who you are and what you can bring to their campus. Plus, it needs to be more than just what they can read about you in your application. While I do not ask you to complete the short answer essays, that are on the "Counselor Supplement Sheet," I do ask that you have your parents complete a "Parent Brag Sheet" and provide me with a list of activities. (You can use the same form that you gave to your teachers if you do not have a resume or list already created.)

So, for the next few months, if you are curious about how I will be spending my "free" time - the answer is writing recommendation letters. Thankfully, I will also be balancing that out with lots of time talking to each of you and getting to know you better... and I am REALLY looking forward to that!

PSAT

The PSAT (practice SAT) will be administered at WKHS on Wednesday, October 14th. Registration for the test starts tomorrow and will continue until Monday, October 12th. Juniors and interested Sophomores can register in the Counseling and Career Center by bringing in a check for $15.00 made out to WKHS. This is an important practice test for the SAT and it is also the qualifying test for the National Merit Scholarship competition. Even if you took the test as a Sophomore you should re-take the test as a Junior!

College Application Process

Did you have a nice day off today? We were in meetings all day so I am definitely jealous that you were able to sleep in for a while. I am excited to have my sister and her family (including my niece and nephew) in town visiting this weekend! With the long weekend, I am guessing that some seniors are working on college applications and I wanted to give you a few reminders:

- You should apply online unless you have some paperwork (like fee waivers) that require you to submit a paper application.

- Please remember though that an essay is an essay and you should take the time to actually work on writing a strong essay, have it edited and reviewed by multiple people before copying and pasting it into your online application.

- After you submit the application you will print out any papers that you need me to complete on your behalf.

- Fill out a yellow Transcript Release Form and turn it in with the form for me to complete and your $2.00 transcript fee to Mrs. Hoyt (Registrar) or one of the Counseling Center Secretaries.
By doing all of this together rather than sending your transcript and then later realizing that you also needed to submit the counselor form you can be certain that the college will receive all of your materials together which helps make sure that it will be filed appropriately so that they can make a decision on your application.

- After you have submitted your application you may also need to verify that your official test scores were sent from the testing organization (ACT/ SAT) directly to the college. If you did not have them sent to that particular school then you will need to pay the fee to have them sent if the college requires official scores from the testing agency.

- Then it is time to sit back and wait...

- When you hear back from your schools, please stop in to see me and let me know the admissions decision as this is something that we track.

College Application Deadlines

As you start through the college application process you will be exposed to a variety of new terms. One area that can be confusing is what all of the different application deadlines such as Early Decision, Early Action, Regular Decision and Rolling Admissions mean.

Early Decision

The key to remember with Early Decision is that it is a final decision and a COMMITMENT! Applying to a school in this program is considered a contract between the student and the college. You can apply to only one school as an Early Decision school. If you are accepted, you are promising to withdraw all other applications. Few students will ultimately apply to a school Early Decision because you are promising to attend the school - without seeing their financial aid package - and most students are not 100% certain that they want to attend one particular school. If you are considering applying to a school under the Early Decision program, please stop in and talk to me.

Early Action

This is a non-binding option and significantly more students will apply to schools using this option. Early Action has an earlier application deadline and students will learn if they have been accepted to the school much earlier than regular decision dates. (Some schools will defer an admissions decision to the Regular Decision deadline if the student is on the bubble and they want to wait to see how the rest of the applications will look.) Early Action is not a contract and, as a student, you are not obligated to attend school at that institution.

Regular Decision

This is the deadline that you will generally see publicized from colleges as it is the most common. This means you are applying and will hear your decision on their regular time schedule. There are no commitments or early notifications. It is important to note that the Regular Admissions deadlines are often AFTER the deadline for scholarship consideration – which adds in a whole additional set of deadlines to watch, but that is a different story for another day.

Rolling Admissions

This means that the colleges look at each application as they arrive and they make a decision as they go. So, if you apply quickly to a school with rolling admissions you are generally going to receive your admissions decision quickly. Schools that function with a rolling admissions policy of evaluating applications will still generally have a regular decision deadline which is the final date that the college is willing to accept any applications for the fall class.

It is really important to be watching your deadlines carefully – I can’t stress that enough! If you are struggling to find the deadlines for different schools, please stop in to see me.

School Report Forms

Thank you to all of the students and parents that attended tonight's Senior College Night! Luckily the rain held off and we didn't get wet in the auditorium... although I am sure that would have been entertaining too. :-)

I was thinking about everything that I hit on tonight and realized that there was one area related to timing of turning in your school report forms that I didn't discuss. As a reminder, these forms are what most of the colleges will require that I complete for you. These forms have lots of different names - School Report Form, Counselor Report Form, High School Information Sheet, etc. They all ask some of the same basic information - what is your GPA, what classes are you taking, and many ask for my feedback on you as a student/ person. Like we discussed tonight, you will turn these forms in with your transcript release forms to Mrs. Hoyt and she will print your transcript and forward them on to me for completion.

What I forgot to mention was the timing related to turning in these forms... I need to ask you to hold onto these on your own rather than bringing them to me really far in advance. For a moment, I am going to ask you to do the math. I have about 100 seniors. Let's say that 85 of you apply to college. Of those 100 some will apply to 1 college, but others will apply to a dozen or more. So, let's guesstimate an average of 3 to 5 colleges per student. That would be approximately 250 to 425 forms that I need to keep track of vs. you keeping the couple of forms on your own and turning them in when it is time for me to actually complete them. You have a much better chance of keeping three forms organized than I do to keep several hundred organized. My goal is to turn around the application materials within a day or two of receiving them from Mrs. Hoyt. I make every effort to fill them out as soon as I receive them and then they will be on their way to your college. The biggest hold up in sending the applications is finding that they need a recommendation letter from me or holding them for a recommendation letter from a teacher.

To help make sure that your college application doesn't just sit on my desk, please pay attention to see if your college needs a counselor recommendation letter. I am more than happy to write the letter for you, but as I have mentioned, I write them in a first-come, first-serve basis in order to be fair, so if you turn in your forms and then when I am filling out your school report form I realize that you need a recommendation letter and we haven't met yet - your application is going to sit on my desk for a while until we can meet and I can write your letter. So, help me to help you by checking that out on your own in advance. If you aren't sure where to look, stop in and see me and we will figure it out together.

A special thank you to Evan Alexander, Molly Burton, David Busch, and Marissa Minichello for volunteering their time to help put together the folders for tonight's meeting!

Searching for a College

The Washington Post has an interesting story (Elite Schools Don't Make Elite People) regarding where well known people have attended college. One of my favorite sections of the Mathews article says, "So relax. Be happy about your chance to spend four years at any school, soaking up the wisdom of the world and deciding what kind of life you want. Those of you who become heroes will discover most of the qualities that made you so were already in your possession."

When you start the college search – the answer lies in you! I know, that sounds a bit cheesy, but it is true. Before you really start looking for the “right” school it is important to figure out what you want in a school and that can only be found by looking in yourself and determining what factors are most important to you.

For example, for some students distance from home may be a big deal. Being close can have it’s advantages – like being able to come home and have a free home cooked meal or a place to do your laundry and also not having to worry about flying half way across the country any time you would want to come home for a visit. Going to school at a college far from home can also have it’s advantages – often a different climate, a new experience and adventure where you can be independent, and no concerns about mom or dad just dropping in unexpectedly. And, of course, there are some students who will elect to find a school that is not too far and not too close. (Remember, that by communicating with your family about what you are looking for in a school you may find that a college outside of your comfort zone is still worth looking at because you and your parents may be able to reach some mutually agreed upon ground rules – so the concern that they might come see you or you might come home too often can be eliminated by talking about those issues up front.)

The size of a school is another factor for many students. Small, Medium, Large or somewhere in between – the challenge is that many students will say, “I don’t know” and that is where making a variety of visits to different sized schools can be advantageous. You can explore a small school and see if the experience of knowing lots of people on campus and in your classes is better for you than a medium or large school where you may have a class in a lecture hall with hundreds of other students. As you visit the schools you may find that there are experiences or advantages that a larger school can provide that a smaller school can’t such as a wider variety of clubs or groups for students to be involved. The key is to figure out what size school fits you and then you can narrow your search to explore more schools in that range.

Other factors that often influence a student’s college decision will include the types of majors or programs offered at the school, their athletic programs – both collegiate sponsored and intramurals, the food, the dorms, the cost (but don’t necessarily eliminate potential colleges simply based upon cost because often the private schools are much more expensive, but also offer a much larger financial aid package to make it competitive and comparable to a public school), extra-curricular opportunities, and on and on.

Again, I cannot stress the point that everyone is different and what is best for one person is not necessarily the ideal school for someone else. All too often I listen to students who are only looking at the 2 or 3 schools that their best friend or sibling looked at rather than trying to find the school that fits best for them. Also, I truly believe that it is about being a good match – for both you and the college.

I know, it can be a bit intimidating to search for a school and to try to figure out what you really want in a college and for your future, but it is also supposed to be fun so try not to put too much pressure on yourself to find “perfection” and try to take a step back and figure out what will make you happy. It really can be fun, but I know it is also overwhelming so remember that I am here to support and help you in any way that I can.

Senior College Night

This Tuesday, September 22nd, at 7:30pm we will be holding the Senior Student and Parent College Night at WKHS. This is one of the most important meetings for senior students and parents to attend because there are so many college related questions that we will be able to answer.

We will be meeting with you in "smaller" groups - all of "my" students and parents will be meeting with just me and the other counselors will meet with their own groups of students and parents. We will have signs posted for where each group will be meeting, but I will have the auditorium this year so you can plan on heading directly there.

We will be reviewing the college search and application process, the procedures for submitting your items to WKHS and to the colleges, and other information you need to know. I really hope you will make every effort to attend… and yes, this is for you and your parents because this is YOUR life, so you need to be there as you are the one responsible for completing all of the work to get accepted into college. It is beneficial for your parents to also attend because they will be a very valuable asset in helping you through this process. And, trust me, your parents will appreciate having an overview of how this entire process will play out so bring them along with you so that they can get the information all at once with you.

I know that it is not always possible for every student and family to attend, but I hope you will try. Remember, I have over 100 seniors, so it becomes very challenging to try to repeat the same basic information and make sure everyone understands unless we all start with the same foundation of information. This evening will answer a lot of your basic questions and then we’ll figure out the rest together as the year continues. I’m looking forward to seeing you on Tuesday night!