Many counselors letters include info about students’ activities outside of school or family situations, etc, as provided to them by the student or the parents. That letter is exactly where that information should go. Counselor letters can provide a broader, more “big picture” take on the student than the teacher recs can, in many cases.

The brag sheet can be a great tool. Try to give specific examples using language that the counselor can directly copy and paste into their letter. Make their job as easy as possible. Ideally, your letter will complement your kid's brag sheet and the rest of the app.

Many high schools ask for parent brag sheets. Both my kids' private and public high schools do. Common app even has a form https://www.commonapp.org/static/3f3686b75714d7b64a84f3731f495351/Resource_FY_FamilyBragSheet_ENG_2025.06.25_1.pdf

The brag sheet? You can write something that is meaningful your kid did out of school and counselor can use that in the letter (briefly such as "kid worked xyz and xyz hours for the last three years") along with anything meaningful kid may have done in school.

It's called a brag sheet. They know a lot about the kids at a private school, but there are probably things you know that your kid hasn't mentioned to them. They're trying to gather information for their recommendation writing.

Anonymous wrote:The college counseling office at our private school has asked us to complete forms about our junior. It asks things like our student’s best qualities and for examples of when our student showed that. I’ve heard that they use these to write the counselor letter. The examples I would have of my student’s best qualities are out of school things that I don’t expect the counselor would write about. For parents who have been through this before, how did you see these forms used? Anything you feel like you did right or wish you did differently when providing this info?

That doesn't make sense. On the contrary, you would like your counselor to know about this (and hopefully write about it) in their recommendation.

The college counseling office at our private school has asked us to complete forms about our junior. It asks things like our student’s best qualities and for examples of when our student showed that. I’ve heard that they use these to write the counselor letter. The examples I would have of my student’s best qualities are out of school things that I don’t expect the counselor would write about. For parents who have been through this before, how did you see these forms used? Anything you feel like you did right or wish you did differently when providing this info?