Letters of Recommendation
Tips for Seeking Letters of Recommendation
For many scholarships, applicants are required to submit one to three letters of recommendation, usually from former professors. Applicants can also submit letters from employers or any other important professional or academic figure who can testify to the quality of the applicant’s achievements and credentials. For those of you who are now applying for scholarships, you should be aware of the fact that letters of Recommendation are perhaps one of the most important components of academic applications, whether you are applying for entrance, an academic job, or scholarship and grant money.
Why precisely, are letters of recommendation (commonly abbreviated LORs) so important? For one, it is the only piece of your application in which another person comments on your work and personal qualities. In most academic applications, you submit a piece of your work, a resume, and perhaps a personal statement or statement of purpose. These bits of information are all supplied by you, so the LOR gives scholarship committees an objective viewpoint to determine with greater certainty whether or not you are a fit candidate for the scholarship.
Apart from being a very important part of a scholarship application, it is also one of the most difficult components of the application to acquire. The first step in gathering your LORs is to determine which professor or employer can best speak to your abilities and personal qualities as they relate to the specific scholarship to which you are applying. For example, if you are applying for a scholarship to receive funds to study abroad, then it would be best to ask a professor of yours who teaches foreign language or any other discipline related to international studies. On the other hand, if you are applying to an engineering scholarship, you would ask an engineering professor or a former employer for whom you did work that relates to engineering, perhaps in the context of a summer internship.
After deciding which LOR writers would best fit the scholarship for which you are applying, the next step is to contact them. If you have not been in contact with your recommenders for a long time, be sure to write a thorough email in which your remind them of your name, when you studied or worked for them, and what you achieved during that time. Always contact your potential recommenders well in advance of the deadline—the earlier, the better. A good rule of thumb to follow is at least a month. Especially if your recommenders are professors, then you will want to give them plenty of time, considering that professors have to write letters of recommendation frequently on top of all the other duties they have like teaching and researching.
Another thing to keep in mind, aside from the association that your recommender might have to the general theme of the scholarship, is to find recommenders who know you well. The better they know you personally, the easier it will be for them to write an honest, highly laudatory appraisal. Most people on scholarship or admissions committees can tell the difference between a “stock” letter of recommendation and one that was written with thought and care. The better you know your recommender, the more likely it is that he or she will write thoughtfully.
A former professor of mine prided himself in writing excellent letters or recommendation, but he told our class that we had to deserve them if he wanted us to write one. One example that he gave was a former student who had taken several of his classes. When this student was a senior, she babysat his kids, and one time one his children refused to eat her food. She tried everything to no avail. Finally, to convince the baby to eat, the student ate some baby food herself to demonstrate how tasty it was, even though the food was essentially a vegetable paste. The professor mentioned this incident in a letter of recommendation, and noted how this one anecdote demonstrated the student’s ability to persevere and to look for solutions creatively. This is the sort of letter of recommendation that you will want to seek out—one in which your recommender tangibly demonstrates your good qualities.
When your recommenders have agreed to write your letter, other than giving them a timeline, give them as much information as you can to make the process as easy as possible so that they can focus on writing the best possible LOR. For example, if the application instructions ask that your recommender mail a letter to specific place, then provide your recommender with a stamped and addressed envelope. Send your recommenders a list of your achievements and your resume so that they can have different things to pick from to highlight in their letter. Always check up on your recommenders to make sure that they are on track. Don’t ask them in the last minute whether they have sent it yet.
Finally, when your recommenders have sent their respective letters, be sure to write each of them a thank letter in which you express your appreciation for all their help. It’s also considered good form to keep in touch with your recommenders and to update them in the case that you do receive the scholarship. Professors especially love to see their former students do well, so be sure to let them know about your successes.
Although getting letters of recommendation is no walk in the park, if you put in the necessary time and effort in selecting your recommenders carefully and helping them help you by providing them with the right information, you’ll have a stronger application. Good luck!
