Recommendation Letters

Most schools ask for 3 (or more) recommendation letters. The common procedure is that the institution's website will ask you for the email addresses of your recommenders, automatically emails them, and gives them instructions on how they should submit their letters. Recommenders are most often professors you have closely worked with during your undergraduate education. If you have done research and work in the industry, your supervisor can also write a recommendation letter. Writing a recommendation letter is time-consuming and difficult. You want to make this easy for your recommenders by doing the following:

  • Ask early! as early as possible! Even earlier than that! You might think two years before applying is too soon but it is not! It simply keeps your advisor alert on what to include in your letter for all that time (they may even take notes) and that will lead to a more detailed and stronger letter than one written in a night, half remembering things about you and your research.

  • Make sure your recommender knows you and your work well. No one can write a good letter about someone they don't know. A good letter references particular details of your work that manifests how good of a researcher and student you are. If you have not worked closely enough with your recommender they can't do that.

  • Meet with your recommender to discuss the details what would matter for each place that you are applying to. You don’t want the recommendation letter to be oblivious to what the schools are looking for. Provide your advisors with the essential info about your work.

  • Send your recommenders your materials. It is a lot better if they already have your application materials.

  • Stay in touch with your advisors and keep them updated about your work. Keeping active is an important component of having good recommendation letters.

A few more tips:

Having big name recommenders is not necessarily a good thing. A detailed excellent letter from a good professor is often a lot better than a vague or uninformative letter from a big name that may not know your work that well.

Just taking one course (or even more) with a professor does not necessarily lend itself to good recommendation letters. They really need to know your work well.