This is written for teachers rather than students.
A student has asked you for a letter of recommendation for a university in the United States or the United Kingdom. If your school has never sent anyone abroad, you have probably had no guidance at all, and the student cannot tell you what is wanted because they do not know either.
The two systems ask for almost opposite things, so this explains them one at a time. Read the half you need.
If you are being asked for both, write them separately. A good American letter will not fit in the British form, and a British letter will look thin to an American reader.
The American system
Who writes what
An American application through the Common App collects two different documents from a school, and they usually come from two different people.
A counselor submits the school forms. Common App says a counselor "will use the Common App recommender system to submit school forms, upload transcripts, and track student application progress". The most important of these is the school report, which carries your school's profile and the student's transcript.
A teacher submits an academic evaluation, which is the letter of recommendation. Common App says a teacher supports a student "by submitting an academic evaluation on their behalf", and the student invites you and assigns you to particular universities on their list.
Most selective universities want more than one teacher. Dartmouth, for example, requires two teacher evaluations as well as a counselor evaluation, which it defines as "a written statement, completed by the applicant's school counselor or school official, that addresses the applicant's academic performance, extracurricular engagements, and personal character".
If your school has no counselor
Many school systems have no such role, and American universities know this. Dartmouth answers this directly: "if your school does not have a counselor, feel free to ask a school psychologist, principal, headmaster, other school official, or third teacher."
So the counselor form can be completed by your head teacher, a deputy, or another senior member of staff. It does not need someone with the job title. Nobody is penalised for a school that is organised differently.
What the teacher form asks you for
This is the part worth seeing before you start, because it is longer than most teachers expect. Harvard publishes the blank Common App teacher evaluation, and it has four parts.
A ratings grid. The form asks "compared to other students in their class, how do you rate this student in terms of" sixteen qualities: academic achievements, intellectual promise, quality of writing, creative thought, productive discussion, faculty respect, disciplined habits, maturity, motivation, leadership, integrity, reaction to setbacks, concern for others, self confidence, initiative, and an overall rating.
There are eight columns to choose between: "no basis", "below average", "average", "good (above average)", "very good (well above average)", "excellent (top 10%)", "outstanding (top 5%)" and "one of the top few encountered in my career". Use "no basis" where you have not seen the quality. It is an honest answer and it is better than guessing.
Two short questions. "How long have you known this student and in what context?" and "What are the first words that come to your mind to describe this student?"
A list of the courses you taught them. The form asks for "the level of course difficulty (AP, IB, accelerated, Cambridge, honors, elective; 100-level, 200-level, etc.)", so say how demanding the course was in whatever terms your own system uses.
The letter itself. The form asks for "a short evaluation (1000 words or less) that will help colleges differentiate this student from others", says it especially welcomes "a broad-based assessment", and asks for "a description of academic and personal characteristics, as demonstrated in your classroom".
How to write the American letter
The form tells you what it is for. A teacher recommendation "lets you share unique insights about your student from the vantage point of the classroom", and can give a view of a student's "intellectual curiosity, creative thought, and work habits".
That means stories from your lessons, not a summary of their grades. The admissions reader already has the transcript. What they cannot get anywhere else is what the student was like in the room.
Write about specific moments. The question they asked that you had not thought of. What they did when they got something wrong. The thing they kept working on after the class moved past it. One remembered incident does more than a paragraph of adjectives.
Say how long you have taught them and in what subject, because the reader needs to know how well you can judge this. The form asks you this outright.
And write it in English. If you are more comfortable drafting in your own language first, do so, then have it translated carefully, but the version submitted has to be in English.
The British system
Now forget all of that, because UCAS works differently in almost every respect. One thing to know before you start: UCAS calls the letter a reference and calls the person writing it the referee, so those are the words you will see on screen.
There is one letter, not several
A British application carries a single letter for the whole application. There is no separate teacher letter and counselor letter, and UCAS tells students they only need one. The same document goes to every course the student has chosen, which can be up to five.
It has three fixed sections and a hard character limit
UCAS sets the structure, and universities receive the letter under three headings.
Establishment details. A general statement about your school. This is about the institution rather than the student, so UCAS gives registered schools a template in the adviser portal to write this statement once and add it to each student's letter with a tick box.
Extenuating circumstances. Anything that affected this student's education and results. UCAS says "it is likely many students will not have extenuating circumstances and, therefore, please confirm this section is not applicable by ticking the box." Leaving it empty is normal.
Other supportive information. Anything else about the student that is relevant to the courses they applied for. UCAS asks for "short, clear, factual statements to help universities and colleges digest the information".
The limit covers all three sections together. UCAS says: "There is a maximum of 4,000 characters within the reference; please note the character count includes spaces, section headings, and line breaks, all of which take up at least one character." Because the headings are counted, the text you type needs to come in under 3,800 characters, which is roughly 600 words for everything, including the part about your school. UCAS adds that this is "a limit and not a target".
It also recommends writing in a word processor first and pasting it in, which is sensible given the limit.
The tone is different
UCAS asks for writing that is "factual, specific, and concise". The warm, narrative letter that works in an American application does not fit here, and would eat the character limit before you reached the student.
Two more rules worth knowing. The letter must be written in English. And under the Data Protection Act 2018 the applicant can ask for a copy of what you wrote, so write nothing you would not be willing to show them.
If your school is not registered with UCAS
Many schools outside the UK are not UCAS registered centres, and in that case the student applies independently and names the person writing the letter themselves.
UCAS suggests a previous teacher, or "a current or previous employer". For someone who left education a while ago, it says "this is where an employer or professional colleague can help." It is explicit about who cannot do it: "don't ask family, friends, partners or ex-partners", and the application can be cancelled as a result.
If you are asked this way, the student adds your details to their application and UCAS will "email them instructions on what they need to do", so you write it online rather than sending anything to the student. UCAS also tells students to say they need "an academic reference to study so they know not to provide a standard HR reference", which is worth knowing if you have only ever written letters for employers before.
The two systems side by side
| United States | United Kingdom | |
|---|---|---|
| How many | A counselor form plus one or more teacher letters | One letter for the whole application |
| Who writes it | A subject teacher, plus a senior staff member for the school form | One person, often a senior teacher, covering the school and the student |
| Length | Up to 1,000 words from each teacher | Under 3,800 characters in total |
| Form | Ratings grid, short questions, course list, written letter | Three fixed sections |
| Tone | Narrative, personal, specific to your classroom | Factual, specific, concise |
| Goes to | Each university separately | Every course chosen, up to five |
What students remember about their teachers
The students in our stories rarely remember what was written about them. They remember a particular person and a particular moment, which is the same material a good letter is made of.
A student who got into Bristol had a university guidance counselor who helped every one of the 60 to 70 students in the cohort. She encouraged all of them to apply through UCAS even if they were not planning on the UK, so they had broader options, and met each student individually at least twice. That student was applying to Oxford, so the counselor met with her around five times.
A student from Egypt now at Tufts on a full scholarship got there because a maths teacher who tutored him told him about a selective boarding school, said "I will apply for you and my son", phoned his father to convince him, and took him to the entrance exam on the day.
A student from rural Uzbekistan who reached HKUST says a school counselor once showed the class a video about a student who had won a scholarship to study abroad, and what mattered was the realisation that it was possible for someone from a background like his.
A student from Kosovo now at Edinburgh felt behind everyone else in her first semester of high school and almost quit, until her combinatorics teacher handed back the grades and she was the only one in the class with a perfect five out of five.
That last one is the kind of thing to put in an American letter. It is one lesson, one piece of work, and one moment you watched a student change their mind about themselves.
What to ask the student before you write
Ask them which country and which universities, because that decides which of the two halves above applies.
Ask them for the deadline, and add a week to it in your own calendar. In the American system you submit to each university; in the British system you write one letter online.
Ask them what they are applying to study, because both systems want the letter to speak to the course.
And ask them to tell you what they think you saw in their class, not so you can copy it, but because students are often wrong about which of their qualities a teacher noticed, and the conversation usually gives you the specific moment the letter needs.
Our guide for the student's side of this, how to ask for a letter of recommendation, is worth sending to them before that conversation.
Kai, the Borderless AI college counselor, is free, and students can use it to work out exactly what each university on their list asks of the person writing the letter, so they can tell you before you start.
Start with Kai, and read the stories from students whose teachers did this for them.
