National College Match

College Prep Scholarship

Student Resource Center

For Educators

Refer A Student

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Educator Resources

Here we offer resources to assist educators as they encourage students to apply to QuestBridge and guide them through the application process.

College Prep Scholarship Informational Materials


You can use this flyer to spread the word about the QuestBridge College Prep Scholarship to high-achieving low-income students. Simply print it out and post it on your campus or distribute it to qualified students.

QuestBridge Flyer

If you are unable to open the file from your internet browser, right click on the link to “save as” to your computer. The file can then be opened from your computer.

If you experience further difficulties opening the file, check whether your computer has Adobe Acrobat Reader installed, a free, widely used document reading program. If not, you may wish to download Acrobat Reader.

Financial Aid


Based on Quest's twelve years of experience with mentoring low-income students as they apply for college admission and financial aid, we have created a PowerPoint presentation that illustrates the financial aid options available to low-income students and their families. This presentation also demonstrates that attending a top-ranked private college can be more affordable for a high-achieving low-income student than attending a public university or community college.

Learn more about the aid process by downloading Quest's thorough Financial Aid Presentation. You will need Microsoft Power Point to view it.

For a PDF version click here.

Recommendation Writing Tips

From our experience, we at Quest have identified the following three tips as central guidelines for writing effective recommendations:

 

  • Use concrete examples to illustrate a student's qualities. For instance, describing a creative class project or mentioning a time when a student generously helped his or her classmates leave a more powerful impression than simply stating that a student is creative or generous.
  • Focus on impressions made through personal contact with a student. Rather than listing his or her extracurricular activities or GPA, include anecdotes from the classroom or other interactions. Remember that your letter is only one piece of the application - we can find lists of activities, leadership roles, and grades elsewhere.
  • Put the student's achievements in the context of his or her life, if you are able. This is especially important for students who may have difficult home situations. Placing the student's performance before the backdrop of any obstacles he or she has faced will help the reader to see how remarkable the student's achievements are when viewed in context.

 

Remember to keep these three style tips in mind when writing your recommendations:

 

  • Style: Write clearly and concisely. From the reader's perspective, short paragraphs and straightforward sentences are easier to tackle than lengthy ones. While editing, take out words or phrases that do not add much to the overall picture of the student - this will keep the reader focused on the central message.
  • Length: A very short letter can actually hurt a student's application. As long as your writing is concise, you need not restrict yourself to one page. If you know the student very well and have more to say, readers will take note of the extra effort you put into writing a longer letter. On the other hand, some of the best letters we have read have been only one page. The key is to use space well - as long as the letter is highly substantive and revealing of the student's character and strengths, it need not be over a page.
  • Presentation: As always, neatness and proper grammar count. Be sure to proofread your letter. Also, we do not advise sending hand-written letters - typed ones set a much more professional tone.

 

We also keep these additional tips in mind when writing and reading recommendations:

 

  • Be wary of templates. When we read recommendations at Quest, we get excited about fresh, individualized letters that emphasize a student's unique strengths and personality. Generic letters cannot help a student. Readers see hundreds of recommendations a day and can spot the form letters.
  • Personalize the greeting for each letter. Inserting the name of the specific school or program shows that you put extra thought into the letter. "Dear Quest Admissions Committee" can make a stronger first impression than "Dear Sir or Madam" or "To Whom It May Concern."
  • Most recommendation letters start by introducing the recommender's relationship with the student (what course he/she took, how long you have known him/her). If you want to be more creative, you do not have to start this way, but make sure you do describe this relationship at some point.
  • Letters also traditionally include a few words describing the writer's experience. Think about how to present your qualifications in a way that will benefit the student. If you have been teaching for thirty years and the student was a highlight of your career, by all means, emphasize this point.
  • Describing your high school is usually not necessary. College admissions officers read applications from specific regions, and within their regions, they know the high schools very well - especially the most challenging schools. That said, in some special cases, emphasizing an unusual aspect of your high school may help put a student's achievements in context. Mentioning that the school offers only a few honors or AP courses, for example, can explain the scarcity of advanced courses on a student's transcript. Most colleges also ask guidance counselors to submit high school-specific information, so you may want to ask a counselor what he or she has included in the application. The bottom line: keep the focus on the student rather than the school.
  • Recommendation forms sometimes ask about students' weaknesses as well as their strengths. However, writing about weaknesses can be dangerous. One effective strategy is to disguise a strength as a weakness: describe a quality that enhances the overall picture of the student by adding a human dimension, for example by emphasizing an outstanding ability for growth. But if you do not feel that you can approach this issue artfully, it is best to leave out the negative and focus on the positive.
  • If you do not feel you can write a positive recommendation letter for a student who requests one, politely decline the request. A negative or even a mediocre letter can severely damage a student's application. When we at Quest receive a negative recommendation, we often wonder why the teacher did not just decline the student's request.

 

Check out accepted.com's Ten Tips for writing college recommendations.