Letters of recommendation: what a strong one contains.
Who to ask, what to give them, and two full sample letters — with a note on what makes each one land.
What to include
A recommendation gives an admissions officer a view of you that the transcript cannot: how you work, how you respond to difficulty, and how you behave toward other people. A letter that only restates your grades adds nothing.
- The referee's contact details and institution
- How long they have known you, and in what capacity
- Specific examples rather than adjectives
- Your standing relative to other students they have taught
- A clear, unqualified recommendation at the end
Who to ask
Someone who taught you recently, in a subject relevant to the course, and who can recall specific work you did. A well-known professor who barely remembers you writes a weaker letter than a tutor who supervised your dissertation.
Ask early, give at least three weeks, and send them your statement of purpose along with a short note on the points you hope they can speak to.
Sample from a teacher
"I have taught John English for two years and supervised his extended essay.
His essay examined the treatment of social inequality in Of Mice and Men. What distinguished it was not the reading — several students read widely — but that he changed his argument halfway through the term when the evidence stopped supporting it, and said so in the introduction. Few students at this level will do that.
He also organised a charity fundraiser for the year group, which required him to coordinate people who did not report to him. It raised more than any previous year.
I recommend John without reservation for undergraduate study in English. He is among the three strongest students I have taught in eleven years."
Sample from a supervisor
"Ayesha worked in my team for eighteen months as a junior analyst.
She inherited a reporting process that took four days each month and rebuilt it to take half a day. What impressed me was that she first spent two weeks asking the people who used the reports what they actually needed, and removed a third of it.
She is straightforward about what she does not know, which in a junior analyst is more useful than confidence.
She has my full support for the MSc in Business Analytics."
What weakens a letter
- Generic praise that would fit any student
- A letter the student clearly drafted themselves
- No indication of how well the referee knows you
- Faint qualifications — "I believe she would probably cope"
- Arriving after the deadline, which reflects on you, not them
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