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(Optional) friend of the family letter of recommendation???
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Anonymous
| Our Dc is applying to Sidwell for Pre-k. They have an optional letter of recommendation other than from your Dc's teacher that you can send it but it can't be from a family member. Did you get one? Should you get one? From whom should you get one? |
Anonymous
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Only submit one if it is from someone who knows the child and can write about them in some meaningful manner.
A boilerplate letter on fancy letterhead would be counterproductive. |
Anonymous
| There was another thread on this, with people disagreeing about the purpose of the letter. I doubt you'll find concensus here: some claim it's innocent, some not so. If you want to use your connections to the best advantage, having your powerful connection (political with kids in the school, or a school trustee) call the school directly for a chat about your family is much more productive. I actually saw a friend make this work. |
Anonymous
OP here, we don't have any political connections or know any school trustee. We were just wondering if parents had them done or recommend having our Dc's friend's parent or her art teacher fill one out. |
Anonymous
| I filled one out for a friend who applied at one of the so-called Big Three. The child was admitted. I highly doubt my note made too much of a difference. |
Anonymous
A family friend wrote a beautiful, touching letter about my DC and our family. We didn't get in to any of the 3 schools we applied - top 3. I'm pretty sure the Sidwell letter is a who-you-know letter. I felt kind of stupid as I realized this after the fact. I mistakingly thought it was all about the child. |
Anonymous
| Good friends sent their own letter to Beauvoir after the playdate stating why they wanted to send their child - apparently it didn't hurt them - they got in - any thoughts on this approach (seems risky to me)...? |
Anonymous
Hmmm, since we don't have any connections, should we not do the optional letter of recommendations? |
Anonymous
| My children got into Sidwell and I asked the mothers of their best friends to write the recommendations. These people were not connected to the school, yet both my children were admitted. I do not think Sidwell is trying to see who you know. |
Anonymous
| A letter from, say a senator who obviously knows very little about your DC - worthless. A letter from that senator who obviously knows your DC very well, and can share a funny anecdote or two - priceless. |
Anonymous
I doubt that even a great, personal letter from a senator is worth much - unless s/he is one of your personal colleagues IN the senate. Or, maybe, if it is Senator Obama or Senator Biden... |
Anonymous
| Now if you are a senator yourself (or DH is a senator), then having another senator write a letter for you is just icing on the cake. |
Anonymous
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I greatly doubt that the letter itself will tip the balance for or against a candidate. I have to imagine that when it comes down to winnowing the final 30 to 24, or whatever, the staff will rely much more heavily on their own observations. So think of the letter as an opportunity to make your child stick out in some way from the intial field of 150 or 200 kids. A lovely letter from a family friend who reports that your child is warm, engaging, compassionate, bright, and well-rounded is hardly like to stick out, IMHO. Neither is a form letter from some random VIP or Sidwell parent who doesn't know your child. But a letter that reports in detail on something unusual or compelling about your child, something they might not notice in the playdate, might leave more of an impression.
(As all the qualifiers above are intended to warn, I have absolutely no inside knowledge of the process but have spent more time thinking about it than I like to admit.) |
Anonymous
| When our son applied as a 7th-grader, an old friend who is an alumna and current SFS parent kindly offered to write a letter for my son, whom she's known since he was born and who's been a friend of her son for almost as long. Our son was admitted, but I never saw the letter and have no idea what impact it had. I can only guess that it was helpful because she knew my son and the school well. I should note that we have no political connections and neither does my friend. However, my son had good scores, good grades, good teacher recommendations, and got lucky when he really clicked with the teacher assigned to interview him. In sum, I don't think any one element of the application will guarantee admission, and I'd also emphasize that luck plays a big part, so don't sweat it too much. |
Anonymous
Not to change the topic, but how do you tell if your child "clicked with the teacher." Several other threads mentioned the importance of your child "bonding with the teachers" during their playdates for pre-K and K. How do you tell or know if they did? |