MathPath Online ACADEMIC Recommendation Form

If you are NOT a math teacher or math coach
You probably should be completing the NON-academic form instead

 

 

Thank you for helping this student apply to MathPath. This form should take you only 10-15 minutes. If you want to write a letter instead of completing this form, you may do so, but it will take longer and it should still cover the sorts of things this form shows we are interested in. If you write a letter, email it as an attachment to smaurer1@swarthmore.edu. Be sure to include the 4-digit code the student gave you.

MathPath is technically not a school, and thus the US FERPA laws do not apply. This means that we are allowed to keep your recommendation confidential, and fully intend to, even though the student has signed no waiver.

After you fill in any box, don't hit Return to go to the next box. On some browsers this submits your survey.  Rather, use Tab or Point-and-Click.  When you are done, hit Submit at the bottom. 

If your recommendation does get submitted prematurely just start again, filling in your name again, then proceeding to where you left off, and ending with a note in the last comment box saying this is a resubmission. There is no way to save this form halfway through and return to it, so you might want to look over the whole thing before starting to answer.

For the longer optional comment boxes at the end, you may want to cut and paste your answer from another program. Do NOT cut and paste from a full-featured word processor like Word, that uses nonprinting characters; this may cause submission to fail. If you want to cut and paste, do so from a pure text program like NotePad or TextEdit.

   

Applicant Name and Information (not yours) 

     Surname (family name)    

     Given (First) Name  

     4-digit code the applicant gave you to use:   (this helps us verify and link your recommendation to the applicant)

 

Information about you

     Your Name (first then last)  

     Email address  

     Phone   Include area code or, if outside US or Canada, country and city codes

     Name of School  

     Street Address

         Line 1  

         Line 2  

         City or Town 

         State or Province abbreviation (if in US or Canada)

         Zip or Postal Code 

         Country if not US  

     Grades you teach (select all that apply)

       5     6      7      8      9      Other (list)  

    How long have you taught school?  

 

The applicant

What course are you teaching this student? Or if you are his/her math coach, explain briefly the coaching relationship.


Note: For the next two questions, please rest assured that we know that schools differ and that at some schools some excellent MathPath candidates are "none of these". No answer below excludes a student from admission.

    Among all students you are teaching this year, this student is

       1st     2nd     top 5     top 10     top 20      none of these

     Among all students you have taught in your entire teaching career, this student is

       1st     2nd     top 5     top 10     top 20      none of these

If you know that this student has scored very well on some national contests in math or other subjects, tell us briefly.

Rate this student from 1 to 10 on the following, where 8 and higher are very high.

     Mathematical ability  

     Mathematical creativity 

     Perseverance 

     Independence 

     Maturity for his/her age 

     How well s/he works with others 

     Ability to explain his/her ideas 

     Friendliness 

     Overall rating 

If other students of yours have come to MathPath, how would you compare this student to the others? The more specific the comparison, the more helpful. E.g., "Jane is not as quick as John Doe who attended last year, but her understanding is deeper. Neither is anywhere as strong as Alice Wu, who attended in 2008."

In this final optional box (which can expand to any length) put anything else you want to tell us, either praise or concerns. If you want to write a letter, best to send it as email as described at the top, because messages in this box lose their formatting.

Thank you again for recommending this student. Due to the large number of applications we get, the thank you page you get upon hitting submit will be your acknowledgment. If upon hitting submit you get an error page instead of a thank you page, don't immediately resubmit, but instead email Prof Maurer. Most likely your recommendation was still submitted, but only up to the answer box in which the error occurred. If we have most of your recommendation, you will only have to resubmit a little. (The error was probably the inclusion of a non-ascii character, either because you used cut and paste, or because you used a non-English keyboard.)