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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Just passing along what we were told by the UVA admissions dean at an information session there last week: With recommendations, they want to hear from a teacher who knows how the student acts and interacts in a classroom and who really knows what the student can bring to a class and a department. That is not limited to only having a science teacher give the recommendation for a student who wants a science program in college. If the history teacher knows your son better personally and can write anecdotes about times your child made a difference in class, or did something unusual and "outside the box" for a project, or showed an especially mature ability to work with others -- then that's the person to do the teacher recommendation. The teacher letter is there to talk about the student AS a student and a person working within a classroom and working with others. If your son has strong math and science grades and test scores, and has said in his essay why he wants to go into engineering, then I would not worry about how it would look to have a teacher of another subject doing the recommendation letter. By the way, this dean said it's perfectly fine for your student to help jog the teacher's memory, if he wants particular projects or interactions mentioned in the letter.

I would think this advice would apply beyond UVA to most any program, but if your kid is scared that a non-science or non-math teacher recommendation will hurt him with a particular program, he should contact that college's admissions office and ASK.

Someone mentioned sending more than one teacher recommendation. Have your son ask about that as well. The UVA dean was very, very emphatic that they do not want any more than ONE counselor recommendation and ONE teacher recommendation and are not likely to read additional recommendations from teachers, coaches, extracurricular adult leaders, whatever. They do not have time, at such a large school. They do require a counselor recommendation because the counselor tells them about the high school and its academics. Some parents noted that in large high schools the counselors don't know the kids individually and the dean said that colleges are well aware of that -- the purpose of the counselor recommendation is not to talk about the individual kid (unless the counselor does indeed know the kid) but to let the college know about the HS and its programs and grade structure etc.

Hope all that helps. It was a huge help for us, if our DC does apply to UVA. I absolutely will have my DC contact the admissions offices at other schools when applying to check those same things. Have your son do the same, OP. Just asking the questions will NOT bias the admissions offices against your son when he applies later -- we heard that over and over on several college tours: Asking things won't flag you in any way.  Better to ask than to waste additional recommendations that won't get read, etc., or conversely, to miss out on sending supplemental materials or recommendations that might help, at some schools. I'm sure some schools out there would be glad to read more than one teacher recommendation but you won't know unless he asks. Good luck (to us all....).[/quote]

Very well said - you took the words right out of my mouth. [/quote]

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