A brief timeline for recommendations.

Quick Bulletin: Your teachers are people. With lives.

So if they offer extra help, office hours, tutoring, go on their schedule, even if it’s not super convenient for you.

If they’re making time for you, thank them profusely.

And this, in particular, is true for recommendations.

And remember, recommendations don’t happen overnight. They take effort, they take time. If you want great recommendations, make sure that your teachers have plenty of time to get them out.

A brief timeline for recommendation success:

Junior Spring: Contact your teachers about writing you a recommendation the next fall. Make sure that you ask them, in person, if they would feel comfortable writing you a recommendation.
Generally they will tell you to remind them in the fall, and talk to them in detail then.

So now you’ve had all summer. You made a CommonApp in August. You’re on track to finish all of your essays by October (ED/EA) or early December (RD).

But there are those scary things that are a bit out of your hands… Recommendations.

If you are planning on applying ED/EA/Rolling, talk to your rec writers the first week of school. Touch base with them; remind them that you had talked about them writing you a rec.

Most teachers will have some kind of paper or form for you to fill out, so get those back to them ASAP, along with the addressed/stamped envelopes.

If you’re applying EA/ED/Rolling, remind them in mid October about the recommendations. Just mention that your deadline is November 1^st (or whatever it is) so it needs to be postmarked soon.

Then ask them once a week until it is in.

Do not hassle them unless it is October 25^th and they’re not in yet. And then make sure you are polite and grateful every time you ask them about it. Do not pester. Do not stalk. Just remind them gently until you’re sure they’re in.

If you are applying regular decision, remind them the first week of school that you had discussed them writing you a recommendation. Then fill out any paper work or forms they give you and return them with (stamped, addressed) envelopes.

Remind them in early November about the recommendations. This is after the ED deadline, so things probably free up. Remind them again in early December. Then ask them weekly about the recommendations until they’re in.
Don’t start hassling about them until the week before winter break begins. But, again, be polite and grateful.

Make sure to thank them. Some students give them some kind of gift (usually around holiday time). I would definitely write a thank you note (handwritten!) and give it to them. Make it detailed and heartfelt. They just wrote at least 100 words about how wonderful you are. They didn’t have to, but they did it.

They took time out of their lives to write you a rec, so be grateful.