College Counseling Letter of Recommendation Workshop

A good letter of recommendation is an important tool that is often vital in helping aspiring seniors to get accepted to the right college or university. An integral part of the application process, letters of recommendation let teachers convey to admission departments the personality, work ethic, and intellectual engagement of their students – to go beyond the application and provide context to the application’s facts. In an effort to help teachers compose the most meaningful, useful, and successful recommendations, College Counseling Directors Marie Bigham and Ed Graf held and afterschool letter-writing workshop for Newman Upper School teachers.

 

Gathering insights from college admission professionals, the counselors shared tips of creating successful letters from the professionals that read them. The teachers learned what information is most important in letters, how to include concrete examples of accomplishment, and how to avoid biases in letters. The session also included a step-by-step guide to using the Naviance software to create and upload letters. The session closed with a discussion of common questions and a case study, “How Does My Letter Fit into All of This?” that demonstrates how the letters of recommendation fit into the whole of the application effort.

 

Marie Bigham was pleased that so many teachers were interested in improving their letter-writing and underscored the importance of the event. “Newman teachers are extremely supportive of our students’ ambitions and hopes for the future. By offering this workshop, we can help our faculty provide unique insight about our seniors, which will then help our students’ college admissions process,” she said. With the information gleaned from the workshop, our Upper School teachers will be able to create even more successful letters of recommendation in the years to come.