Guidelines for letters of recommendation

This page contains advice for people asking for a letter of recommendation from me (or someone like me).

Before you ask me to write a letter of recommendations, please consider the following the questions:

• Do I know who you are and have a good impression of your abilities? For example, have you taken a course or several courses with me? Or do I know you outside of a course context? If you took a course with me, did you get get a higher enough grade (B+ or higher) for me to write a strong letter? If not, do you have a compelling argument for why I should write a letter? How did you distinguish yourself in my class(es)?

• Why a letter from me will help you achieve your goal? For example, if you are applying for graduate school or a teaching job related to mathematics, that is easy for me. But if you are applying for an industrial job, what aspects of your abilities or skills do you want me to discuss in the letter?

When you email me asking for a letter of recommendations, please provide the following materials:

• A list of places that you will be applying.

• A list of your other letter writers and their affiliations.

• Everything you will be submitting, such as (not meant to be exhaustive) your CV or resume, application letter, research or teaching statement for jobs, teaching evaluations, research work/paper, etc.

• Anything that you think I should or could write more about your qualifiations than any other letter writers.

After I agree to write a letter, please

• Give me a minimum of 3 weeks to complete the letter. In general, I would prefer 2 months advance notice. The less notice I receive from you, the more likely it is that I will submit your letter late.

• Waive your right to see any letters I submit. Schools won’t take my letter seriously if they know the students have acess to the letter. This is extremely important and plese don’t click the wrong button in the online application system because it will be hard to change.

• Make sure that you enter my information into the online system well in advance so I can upload the letter. For paper application, please include addressed envelope with postage and my address listed as the return address.

• Feel free to email me one week before the letter is due or even earlier if I haven’t told you the letter has been submitted.

Credits: Many of the ideas above are borrowed from the recommendation letter webpages of Keith Conrad and Ravi Vakil.