College SOE's

Hello SAF:

I am wondering if you all have recommendations for my college SOE's as a reapplicant to West Point. I am currently taking chemistry, calculus I, microeconomics, a required bible course, the MS1 Military Science course as well as public speaking class. I am doing quite well in chem and econ, and my calculus grades are passing, but not stellar. Would requesting evaluations from my chem and econ teachers be a good idea? I was also thinking about my professor of military science. He is a West Point grad, and I've talked with him extensively about West Point and my reapplication. I will talk to senior cadets and Cadre to see their thoughts on that, but would having him write up a separate SOE be beneficial?

Thank you for your help and time.
- Jake

Go for the teachers that like you the most and know you. Make sure to give them some info about yourself (clubs, sports, etc.) also there is an upload portion on the application. You can get extra letters of recommendation and I Highly recommend this. Send in as many as possible.

civic29 said:

Go for the teachers that like you the most and know you. Make sure to give them some info about yourself (clubs, sports, etc.) also there is an upload portion on the application. You can get extra letters of recommendation and I Highly recommend this. Send in as many as possible.

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That is exactly what I was thinking. I have talked quite a bit with my econ and chem teacher too, which would be quite helpful.

I saw that tab, but I wasn't sure it would work in my favor? I would think that the board wouldn't have time to read through all the letters people would upload if it was a free for all.

Thanks for the help, civic29! Hope plebe year is going well for you.

I was able to catch a glimpse of my admissions scores and one of my highest was recommendations. I'm just speculating but I assume that my recommendations from other teachers, coaches, etc. helped me a lot.

civic29 said:

I was able to catch a glimpse of my admissions scores and one of my highest was recommendations. I'm just speculating but I assume that my recommendations from other teachers, coaches, etc. helped me a lot.

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Good to know! I'll scan and upload a few of my nomination recommendations. For reference, how many did you upload?

I uploaded 5 extra from my coaches, a couple other teachers, and a church pastor

And my guidance counselor

Input from your PMs should come on the ROTC nomination. There is space for them to write about you in addition to just giving you a nomination.

In general, for college SOEs, you should pick the teachers who know you the best that are the closest to the classes at West Point. If you are in a large seminar classes taught mainly by a TA, then talking to the professor first is good; however, most of them cannot speak to your leadership potential because they don't know you. Make sure they know that they are evaluating you on leadership potential and not just how well you are doing on the two pop-quizzes and midterm that they can see in their grade book.

As far as additional letters of recommendation, they are for the most part useless. Unless you have a serious issue in your file (failing grades, suspension, arrest, etc), that is going to warrant a review by the enitre admission committee to consider a waiver, then there is no point in putting them in your West Point application. THEY DO NOT ADD ANY POINTS TO YOUR FILE. Could you imagine trying to subjectively score additional letters based on content and source, or just giving away points based on how many additional recommendations a candidate got whether they were any good or just had someone write? It would ruin the WCS system. Do yourself and your RC a favor and before you fill your file with additional letters of recommendations from your Aunt Sally's friend who knew someone that was a general, talk to your RC. They will probably tell you the same thing if you ask correctly (though they would never tell you not to submit something). If there are any shortcomings, they would probably be reaching out to you at some point anyway to get more information on it anyway.