Letter of Recc. Help

Comments

• keepcalmandneuron Alum Member

  September 2018 470 karma

  Generally, for the majority of applicants (fresh out of college, maybe 2-3 years work experience under their belt since high school), academic references (given that you did exceptional in their classes AND you have a strong relationship with the profs) are given more weight than professional references for obvious reasons.

  For mature applicants who've been out of school for 10+ years and have been working, it's pretty common sense to get a letter from their superiors that they've been working for a very long period of time.

  I don't know which category you are in but assuming that you are straight from college with a little bit of work experience, it wouldn't hurt to include the last one ONLY IF the 2 academic references are each solid on their own. If not, adding the third one just dilutes the whole package and it feels like you are just trying to cover up the lack of quality with quantity.
• _oshun1_ Alum Member

  September 2018 edited September 2018 3652 karma

  Ask for all of the recs and figure it out later as some professors/employers lag on responding. I agree that you just need 2 academic LORs unless you’ve been out of school for more than 2-3 yrs.
• Alex Alum Member ⭐

  September 2018 23929 karma

  I say if your employer can write you a strong letter you should take it. Some schools do ask for 3 (although the standard is two). In any case, as stated above, if you've been out of school for more than a 3-5yrs I would certainly get the LOR from your employer.
• natedawg Alum Member

  September 2018 57 karma

  @Alex said:
  I say if your employer can write you a strong letter you should take it. Some schools do ask for 3 (although the standard is two). In any case, as stated above, if you've been out of school for more than a 3-5yrs I would certainly get the LOR from your employer.

  @"surfy surf" said:
  Ask for all of the recs and figure it out later as some professors/employers lag on responding. I agree that you just need 2 academic LORs unless you’ve been out of school for more than 2-3 yrs.

  @keepcalmandneuron said:
  Generally, for the majority of applicants (fresh out of college, maybe 2-3 years work experience under their belt since high school), academic references (given that you did exceptional in their classes AND you have a strong relationship with the profs) are given more weight than professional references for obvious reasons.

  For mature applicants who've been out of school for 10+ years and have been working, it's pretty common sense to get a letter from their superiors that they've been working for a very long period of time.

  I don't know which category you are in but assuming that you are straight from college with a little bit of work experience, it wouldn't hurt to include the last one ONLY IF the 2 academic references are each solid on their own. If not, adding the third one just dilutes the whole package and it feels like you are just trying to cover up the lack of quality with quantity.

  Thank you all the for responses.

  Looks like I should've mentioned earlier: I graduated this past Spring but have been working at the attorney's office for about 2 years. With that, would you all still suggest 2 LOR's or 3 (with the attorney's)?
• Leah M B Alum Member ⭐

  September 2018 8392 karma

  I think 3 is the ideal number to have on hand. Agree with @Alex that you should at least get the letter, and you can decide later whether or not to use it.

  I think you should default to using the 2 academic LORs, and if you need a 3rd for some reason, it'd be ok to use a professional one. A 3rd academic one would probably be best, so maybe also think about who might be able to give you another one of those. It doesn't necessarily have to be a professor; it can be a TA or a professor that you assisted, it can be flexible. But I say get the professional one and use it as a back up if needed. Being a recent graduate, schools are going to prefer academic references over professional. Some schools do allow up to 3 - for example, Northwestern allows up to 3 and they recommend you submit that many, although I think 1 is their minimum.
• Ohnoeshalpme Alum Member ⭐

  September 2018 2531 karma

  Generally you want to include at least 1 academic letter, ideally 2 academic letters. For applicants who have been out of school for some time, however, a non-academic letter is often stronger. In this case, I would recommend that you include 1 academic letter and 1 non-academic letter. For schools that require 2 academic letters you will have to include 2 academic letters.