Grad students have taught only a few courses, and have had few students. They do not yet know how to write effective letters of rec. They are also usually not published scholars, and are thus not “known quantities” to faculty committees. For all of these reasons, it is not good practice to solicit letters from grad students.

Letters from former professors in ANY department are what is expected.

Best wishes to you!

It doesn’t matter so much WHO writes the letter as much as the quality of the content relative to the needs of the committee evaluating your application.

From my experience on application review and scholarship review committees…most schools are trying to find “outstanding” students. So a key factor in the letter has to clearly set you apart from other applicants. You need to figure out what criteria or characteristics the school values in students they see as outstanding.

Generally, consider what makes a good worker…because in one sense, your job as a student is to study…and the college/university and professors are like your bosses…only they usually pay you with a grade.

Consider you goals…what you want to do, and why you want to do it…and AFTER you graduate, what will you do to with your education and degree. It’s a given one of your goals is to graduate…and what you want to do is associated with your major….but what they don’t know is why you are interested in the major…and once you are educated, what will you do with your degree….and how that might reflect on the college.

And now, the challenge is to find someone who knows you well enough to answer those questions for the school by writing a letter of recommendation for you. And get real, how many of professors really get to know their students that well…unless of course, you engage them in conversations through the term. So yes, grad teaching assistants see you work and can assess your performance and such…good insights for a grad school committee.

If you need an idea of what characteristics make a good worker (and believe me, there are many of them that apply to being an “outstanding student”) visit http://www.neighborhoodlink.com/public/clubextra.html?nclubid=893282700&nid=268367529 and learn about SCANS…a study done by the US Dept of Labor.

Use the SCANS checklist to document your studies and performance. In other words, do a personal inventory using the SCANS checklists. Look at job descriptions for your intended major / profession. Do a SCANS checklist of the job description….compare/contrast it to your personal inventory to see how well prepared you are for that job….any differences point out what you may need to study to acquire the necessary knowledge/skills for that job. Use the SCANS checklists to assess your college course…and know what knowledge and skills you got from them.

Put it all together….be sure the letters of recommendation include specific facts to support the statements…and that key words from the SCANS checklists show up in the letter. Best way to have that happen is to give a draft letter to the person you ask for the recommendation….along with a copy of your resume, transcripts, and a biographical essay or an essay about why you chose your major. In other words, do your homework and provide the writer with all the tools and facts necessary to do a good job. They can toss your draft….or, they can use it…modify it…embellish it….but if they have to start from scratch…and have little to go on…how can you reasonable expect them to do a good job for you?

I have read many letters of recommendation from various sources….its the quality and factual content of the letter that is more important than the title of the writer.

When a professor writes “one of the best students I ever had” I really have to wonder…so how many students is that? and best is relative…if all of the other students had bad grades and one student was on the high end of the bad grades…that makes the high scorer the “best” of the low grades…

Whomever you approach, do them the courtesy of providing them with the background materials to do a good job…along with sufficient time to do it…clearly stating the deadline, where the letter is to be sent, along with an pre-stamped and addressed envelope.

Sure hopes this helps. Good luck and best wishes…