Northwestern does not require letters of recommendation? Forum

[Shrimps]

Any reason why? What other schools do not require LORs? Is this a new trend?

[alive]

It might not be required, but that doesn't mean it is a good idea not to send them.

Berkeley is the same.

[Aggiegrad2011]

be careful here - Northwestern only will accept ONE LoR, and in order for you to be able to submit that LoR, you need to fill out their CPE - Career progress evaluation. Or, rather, you need to give it to that letter-writer, who will fill it out, then give it back to you SEALED, whereupon you then send it to Northwestern.

I just finished my Northwestern app today so I know the pain well. I really like the program though and I have my Chicago interview the Friday after next. Huzzah.

For UCB, I sent two targeted LoRs.

[Lwoods]

be careful here - Northwestern only will accept ONE LoR, and in order for you to be able to submit that LoR, you need to fill out their CPE - Career progress evaluation. Or, rather, you need to give it to that letter-writer, who will fill it out, then give it back to you SEALED, whereupon you then send it to Northwestern.

And to be clear, the CPE is in lieu of the letter, not in addition to. Though they will accept both, they prefer the CPE.

[oxford_don]

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[hellome]

be careful here - Northwestern only will accept ONE LoR, and in order for you to be able to submit that LoR, you need to fill out their CPE - Career progress evaluation. Or, rather, you need to give it to that letter-writer, who will fill it out, then give it back to you SEALED, whereupon you then send it to Northwestern.

And to be clear, the CPE is in lieu of the letter, not in addition to. Though they will accept both, they prefer the CPE.

??? It was my reading of the CPE that they want the recommender to fill out the form, answer the questions, and enclose it with their letter of recommendation. ie. they write a normal letter and then answer those short questions. I could definitely be wrong about this. What do people think?

no, it is IN LIEU of the letter - only the CPE

[Lwoods]

be careful here - Northwestern only will accept ONE LoR, and in order for you to be able to submit that LoR, you need to fill out their CPE - Career progress evaluation. Or, rather, you need to give it to that letter-writer, who will fill it out, then give it back to you SEALED, whereupon you then send it to Northwestern.

And to be clear, the CPE is in lieu of the letter, not in addition to. Though they will accept both, they prefer the CPE.

??? It was my reading of the CPE that they want the recommender to fill out the form, answer the questions, and enclose it with their letter of recommendation. ie. they write a normal letter and then answer those short questions. I could definitely be wrong about this. What do people think?

no, it is IN LIEU of the letter - only the CPE

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Don't worry, though, oxford_don; they're aware of the confusion and I doubt they'll hold it against you if you've submitted both. I just think they'll look much more closely at the CPE than the letter.

[oxford_don]

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[CSCS Trainer]

FWIW - when I spoke to NU, they told me they accepted more than 1 LOR, and that my recommenders should fill out the CPE and enclose it with the LOR's.

[Aggiegrad2011]

Hmph, the application had more than a paragraph of stuff on how you can submit a letter or recommendation if and only if you also have the letter writer fill out a CPE. In fact, you had to write the name of the recommender chosen in the application along with affiliation, so obviously they are willing to look at it. If you weren't attaching an LoR, you didn't have to fill that out. Since there's a spot for it, once must assume that they are OK with you using it.

I sure hope they don't hold it against me.

[oxford_don]

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[Lwoods]

Has anybody used the option of having their CPE submitted electronically via surveymonkey? Just found this on their blog, and my boss would much prefer this plus it cuts down the time of having LSAC process the form.

That's how my former boss submitted it. She said it was strange because after she hit "submit", it went back to the homepage, but when I called the office, they confirmed that it was received and with my file.

[EbonyEsq]

But the CPE only applies to those who have/had work experience?

I wish to send my LOR from my professor AND my CPE/LOR from my employer. Can that work? Would they except both?

[RTFM]

But the CPE only applies to those who have/had work experience?

I wish to send my LOR from my professor AND my CPE/LOR from my employer. Can that work? Would they except both?

The thing is, Northwestern doesn't really care about LORs from professors, period. You can send it, but that doesn't guarantee that they'll read it and I have a feeling that 99.99% of the time it will not help you, and could in fact hurt you because you didn't follow their directions.

The CPE is actually very similar to a LOR in that it does ask open-ended questions (but this way, Northwestern can get exactly the info they want). If your employer has already written a LOR, they should be able to easily fill out the CPE, and probably they can just copy/paste the relevant portions of the LOR into the CPE. You likely wouldn't be hurt by sending both because, as someone else pointed out, Northwestern realizes that they've been giving confusing directions about the whole thing. But in most cases the LOR is probably (and should be) redundant on top of the CPE.

[EbonyEsq]

But the CPE only applies to those who have/had work experience?

I wish to send my LOR from my professor AND my CPE/LOR from my employer. Can that work? Would they except both?

The thing is, Northwestern doesn't really care about LORs from professors, period. You can send it, but that doesn't guarantee that they'll read it and I have a feeling that 99.99% of the time it will not help you, and could in fact hurt you because you didn't follow their directions.

The CPE is actually very similar to a LOR in that it does ask open-ended questions (but this way, Northwestern can get exactly the info they want). If your employer has already written a LOR, they should be able to easily fill out the CPE, and probably they can just copy/paste the relevant portions of the LOR into the CPE. You likely wouldn't be hurt by sending both because, as someone else pointed out, Northwestern realizes that they've been giving confusing directions about the whole thing. But in most cases the LOR is probably (and should be) redundant on top of the CPE.

But not all applicants have relevant work experience. Some do not even work during college. What of these prospective students?

[Lwoods]

But the CPE only applies to those who have/had work experience?

I wish to send my LOR from my professor AND my CPE/LOR from my employer. Can that work? Would they except both?

The thing is, Northwestern doesn't really care about LORs from professors, period. You can send it, but that doesn't guarantee that they'll read it and I have a feeling that 99.99% of the time it will not help you, and could in fact hurt you because you didn't follow their directions.

The CPE is actually very similar to a LOR in that it does ask open-ended questions (but this way, Northwestern can get exactly the info they want). If your employer has already written a LOR, they should be able to easily fill out the CPE, and probably they can just copy/paste the relevant portions of the LOR into the CPE. You likely wouldn't be hurt by sending both because, as someone else pointed out, Northwestern realizes that they've been giving confusing directions about the whole thing. But in most cases the LOR is probably (and should be) redundant on top of the CPE.

But not all applicants have relevant work experience. Some do not even work during college. What of these prospective students?

The CPE is not required. While those coming straight from undergrad seem to face an uphill battle with Northwestern admissions, truly outstanding candidates are still offered admission... and the NU adcomm is probably able to identify those truly outstanding candidates without an academic LOR.

[jd2b1010]

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[betsyclaire]

Hi! Like everyone else on this post, I have been a bit baffled by Northwestern's CPE non-requirement. However, when I was reading their admission blog, I found this great description from someone in the admission department with actual answers.

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Really cleared everything up for me so I highly recommend reading it. The other blog entries are also pretty good!

I asked a Board member from the non-profit org that I worked at to submit one for me. After reviewing the possibilities for submission, I decided that Survey Monkey is superior to sending it in to LSAC so that is the option I suggested to her.

Hope this is as helpful to all of you as it was to me! Best of luck to everyone in their applications!