How do I ask my professor for a reference letter?

Should I ask a professor for a letter of reference if I got an A- in his class?

  • My dad thinks I should ask him for a letter of recommendation because he's a big name and seems like a very nice person, but I didn't do great in his class.

  • Answer:

    That's a tough one.  You haven't said what the curve was.   If an A- puts you in the top 10% of the class, may be.  If it puts you in the top 50% of the class, may be not. But really, think about what that professor will be able to say about you.  If you didn't have much interaction with him/her during the course, then they simply won't be able to say much. Not saying much doesn't hurt you (unless what they say is outright negative), but it won't do much of anything other than telling the admissions committee that you were in their class and did alright. On the other hand, if you talked a lot with the professor after class and in office hours.  Asked good questions. Turned in good homework and just futzed up the midterm, they may be able to write a good letter for you. Also if they're a really big name, then they could have their admins write their letters.  You can sometime suss this out and then the question is, how does their admin write letters. I'd think about asking people who applied last year for graduate school who they got to write their letters and see if they have any advice. On a personal note, I can't remember the exact grade I gave someone.  I usually don't care.  I'm more interested if they are engaged and curious and seem like they'll be good in graduate school.

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You should only ask for letters from people that you know will give you a strong recommendation.  There is nothing worse than being "damned with faint praise" .  No one writes a bad letter; the world is to litigious and most profs don't want to crater someone's chances.  If you don't know the person well, it won't be strong; trust me.  As a work around, just ask something like "do you feel you could write me a strong letter of recommendation based on my work and your knowledge of me"?  Too pushy?  Maybe, but it's what you need.  A letter from some one at the top of their field is only as good as what they say about you.

Michael W. Long

Let me quote Mor Harchol-Balter, Associate Professor @ CMU, who nicely summed up the common sense: Ideally you would like to make all your letters of recommendation count. Consider the following two letters: i. Letter 1: “I highly recommend student X for your graduate program. Student X received an A+ in my undergraduate algorithms class. He was ranked Number 2 out of 100 students. He got the highest score on the final. He worked very hard all semester, never missed a class, and was always able to answer the questions that I asked in class. This conscientious attitude makes him an excellent candidate for any graduate program. ” ii. Letter 2: “I highly recommend student Y for your graduate program. Student Y received a B in my undergraduate algorithms class. He was ranked Number 29 out of 100 students. Halfway through the semester we started working on network flows. Student Y seemed extremely excited by this topic. He disappeared for 4 weeks and even missed an exam. However when he came back, he showed me some work he had been doing on a new network flow algorithm for high-degree graphs. He had done some simulations and had some proofs. I’ve been working with student Y for the past couple months since then and he is full of ideas for new algorithms. I think student Y’s initiative makes him an excellent candidate for any graduate program.” Which letter do you think is stronger? It turns out that Letter 2 is very strong. Letter 1 actually counts as 0. At CMU we mark all letters like letter 1 with the acronym D.W.I.C.. This stands for “Did Well In Class” which counts for 0, since we already know from the student’s transcript that he did well in class. By contrast, student Y’s letter gives us a lot of information. It explains that the reason student Y didn’t do better in class was that he was busy doing research. It also tells us that student Y started doing research on his own initiative, and that he is quite good at doing research. The professor was impressed enough with student Y’s ideas that he took him on as a student researcher despite student Y not having high grades.

Franck Dernoncourt

"My dad thinks I should ask him for a letter of recommendation" Does your dad have relevant experience hiring in the field you're trying to get into?  If so, you should probably listen to him.  If not, keep in mind that your parents' opinions are just as good as those of a random guy off the street.  (This is a general life lesson, applicable in far more situations than the one at hand.)

Daniel McLaury

On the other hand, if you talked a lot with the professor after class and in office hours. Asked good questions. Turned in good homework and just futzed up the midterm, they may be able to write a good letter for you. Yes, this precisely happened with me and 1 of the 4 LORs I used when applying for programs this year. It came from a class where I was turning in good homework but where I ****ed up the midterm for some weird reason (which crushed my grade to the extent that I got a GPA below 3.0 in it). But I was extremely engaged and frequently sought out contact out of class, and he really encouraged me to apply to Caltech. While I didn't get into Caltech, I did get into both Brown and UChicago - both with special fellowships for top applicants. By the way, my two other LORs came from professors who gave me A-'s in their graduate-level classes. I'm simply not the type of person who naturally gets high grades in my classes (I generally only put in as much effort as it takes to achieve diminishing returns on the effort and then I switch to something else).

Alex K. Chen

Depends on the level of personal interaction you had with the professor. If there was little interaction, it probably won't be a very helpful letter. It there was and you're unsure whether it was positive/negative, definitely ask the professor straight up. Most professors will readily let you know if they think a letter from them would not be helpful to you (it's in their interest, since they don't want to waste their time writing it anyway).

Chaitu Ekanadham

A- is not a bad grade.  What matters is what the course was, and how much interaction you had.  Just as a hypothetical example, if you were an undergraduate that took quantum field theory and got an A-, you are probably going to get a glowing recommendation.

Joseph Wang

hat's the purpose of this letter? If it's for graduate school -- Grades aren't that relevant. What is relevant is whether the professor knows you and can say things like "this person will succeed in graduate school" or better yet "don't steal this person, I want to have him/her as my student!" A letter that just says "bright, A-, top 10%" is not going to help and may hurt.   If it's for a summer program -- don't sweat it much, but similar criteria as grad school.   If it's for some other employer -- I don't know for what they are looking.

David Molnar

absolutely!  your 'value' isn't about the grade you received in the class; rather, its about your relationship with the professor; his/her perception of you as a person.  Worst case the prof can say no or even give you a lousy reference.  If that's the case you know where you stand.

Ed Schlesinger

If you do something interesting then I can write a good and relevant recommendation.  It's hard to write a memorable recommendation for someone I don't recall, even if their grades are perfect.  Moral: get involved, perfection may have less risk, but is boring.

Gio Wiederhold

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