Cornell Recommendation questions

luckykai

Anyone checked out the Johnson recommendation?
My recommender told me that 2 of the questions are quite similar. One is asking about the applicant's most outstanding characteristics. The other one is to give examples of the applicant's performance rated as "outstanding".

I have to agree with my recommender on this. I don't know how to differentiate these 2 questions.
Anyone any thoughts?

forevercoco

These are actually two different questions

You can interpret the 1st one as: What's this person's top strengths? Just name two or three.

The 2nd one is giving further example for any rating of top 2% or 5%? Sorry I can't remember clearly. For example, if your recommender think you are outstanding at communication, he will need an example to supporting his rating.

I think most applicants might have coincidence  in "top strength" and "characteristics" rated as "outstanding". My suggestion is to focus the first one on an overview of the applicant and the second one on a demonstrative example.

luckykai

Thank you so much for your suggestion!

I know these are 2 questions. But I think they are linked tightly. To clarify your comments, did you mean that for the first question, the recommender only needs to summarize a few strengths of the applicant with no need to give any example or further explanation? And in question 2 the recommender should give specific examples of these strengths  which are listed in question 1?

My recommender and I are mainly confused about whether the strengths called out in these two questions have to or do not have to be the same. If they need to be the same strengths, isn't question 1 kind of a redundant question? Since the Ad Com can find out the applicant's outstanding areas from the rating section. But on the other hand, it doesn't make sense to me if they don't have agree and the recommender claims a couple of most outstanding characteristics of the applicant in question 1 but does not rate these strengths as top 2% - outstanding.

These are actually two different questions

You can interpret the 1st one as: What's this person's top strengths? Just name two or three.

The 2nd one is giving further example for any rating of top 2% or 5%? Sorry I can't remember clearly. For example, if your recommender think you are outstanding at communication, he will need an example to supporting his rating.

I think most applicants might have coincidence  in "top strength" and "characteristics" rated as "outstanding". My suggestion is to focus the first one on an overview of the applicant and the second one on a demonstrative example.

-- by 会员 forevercoco (2012/10/17 8:10:06)

forevercoco

Hi, what I'm thinking is that the first question is purely about you, and the second question is about comparing you to others. It could be possible that someone has several "top strengths"  but doesn't belong to the 2% group while compared to others.


An easy way to think about this is to answer the 1st Q with summary and example and to answer the 2nd Q with only a small example. You can use different examples or the same one. But I will assume that if you're graded outstanding for certain characteristic, you should have more than one examples to support it


You can also use small-scale examples, which focus on a single incidence or a large-scale examples, which focus on your growth in a relevantly long time, to answer different Qs.


Hope it helps. Good luck!

Thank you so much for your suggestion!

I know these are 2 questions. But I think they are linked tightly. To clarify your comments, did you mean that for the first question, the recommender only needs to summarize a few strengths of the applicant with no need to give any example or further explanation? And in question 2 the recommender should give specific examples of these strengths  which are listed in question 1?

My recommender and I are mainly confused about whether the strengths called out in these two questions have to or do not have to be the same. If they need to be the same strengths, isn't question 1 kind of a redundant question? Since the Ad Com can find out the applicant's outstanding areas from the rating section. But on the other hand, it doesn't make sense to me if they don't have agree and the recommender claims a couple of most outstanding characteristics of the applicant in question 1 but does not rate these strengths as top 2% - outstanding.

These are actually two different questions

You can interpret the 1st one as: What's this person's top strengths? Just name two or three.

The 2nd one is giving further example for any rating of top 2% or 5%? Sorry I can't remember clearly. For example, if your recommender think you are outstanding at communication, he will need an example to supporting his rating.

I think most applicants might have coincidence  in "top strength" and "characteristics" rated as "outstanding". My suggestion is to focus the first one on an overview of the applicant and the second one on a demonstrative example.

-- by 会员 forevercoco (2012/10/17 8:10:06)

-- by 会员 luckykai (2012/10/17 10:08:02)

luckykai

Truly appreciate for your very helpful insight. I totally got it and I agree with your analysis.
If you are applying for Cornell and other B-schools of 2013, good luck to you too!

Hi, what I'm thinking is that the first question is purely about you, and the second question is about comparing you to others. It could be possible that someone has several "top strengths"  but doesn't belong to the 2% group while compared to others.


An easy way to think about this is to answer the 1st Q with summary and example and to answer the 2nd Q with only a small example. You can use different examples or the same one. But I will assume that if you're graded outstanding for certain characteristic, you should have more than one examples to support it


You can also use small-scale examples, which focus on a single incidence or a large-scale examples, which focus on your growth in a relevantly long time, to answer different Qs.


Hope it helps. Good luck!

Thank you so much for your suggestion!

I know these are 2 questions. But I think they are linked tightly. To clarify your comments, did you mean that for the first question, the recommender only needs to summarize a few strengths of the applicant with no need to give any example or further explanation? And in question 2 the recommender should give specific examples of these strengths  which are listed in question 1?

My recommender and I are mainly confused about whether the strengths called out in these two questions have to or do not have to be the same. If they need to be the same strengths, isn't question 1 kind of a redundant question? Since the Ad Com can find out the applicant's outstanding areas from the rating section. But on the other hand, it doesn't make sense to me if they don't have agree and the recommender claims a couple of most outstanding characteristics of the applicant in question 1 but does not rate these strengths as top 2% - outstanding.

These are actually two different questions

You can interpret the 1st one as: What's this person's top strengths? Just name two or three.

The 2nd one is giving further example for any rating of top 2% or 5%? Sorry I can't remember clearly. For example, if your recommender think you are outstanding at communication, he will need an example to supporting his rating.

I think most applicants might have coincidence  in "top strength" and "characteristics" rated as "outstanding". My suggestion is to focus the first one on an overview of the applicant and the second one on a demonstrative example.

-- by 会员 forevercoco (2012/10/17 8:10:06)

-- by 会员 luckykai (2012/10/17 10:08:02)

-- by 会员 forevercoco (2012/10/17 13:23:42)