Sample Mitchell Scholarship Recommendation

SAMPLE MITCHELL SCHOLARSHIP RECOMMENDATION
September xx, 20xx
The US-Ireland Alliance

th
1747 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, 12 Floor
Washington, D.C. 20006
To the Mitchell Scholarship Selection Committee:
I am pleased to write in support of Janet Lerner’s application to receive a Mitchell Scholarship.

I know Janet well; she initially developed her thesis proposal in one of my classes and I direct a
workshop in which she is bringing that proposal to fruition with other seniors. I am also her
honors advisor in Political Science, and I selected her to serve as the undergraduate
representative to the department Undergraduate Committee, which I chair. We talk frequently
about her academic interests, career goals, travels, and many campus responsibilities.
Janet is impressive, and growing more so each year. Her academic work is excellent: she writes
well, she offers valuable and at times exceedingly insightful comments, she is always prepared,
and on group projects she elevates the performance of those around her. But without doubt her
finest academic achievement is the honors thesis she is now writing. I believe it will be among
the best we have seen here in the last ten years, and we produce an average of eight to ten these a
year.
Janet developed and refined her research proposal on collective identity in Northern Ireland
women’s groups in a class she took with me two years ago. No honors student that I have
worked with, let alone a sophomore, has developed a research idea and then set up the
appropriate field work with comparable skill and determination. Janet used her junior year to do
advanced graduate course work on comparative methods. She then spent the summer conducting
interviews and doing archival research. And what a trove of material she has developed! Rich,
sensitive, and theoretically revealing interviews that demonstrate her grasp of the material and
ability to connect with her subjects. I expect her thesis to make important academic contributions
to our notions of identity and its importance to politics as wells as substantive contributions to
our understanding of politics in regions plagued by years of conflict. My hope is that she will
continue to mine her material and push her ideas in advanced academic work, preferably in
Europe.
But to fully appreciate Janet Lerner you need to go far beyond her intellectual abilities. She is a
force on campus and outside, but one who tends to work within rather than outside the system.
Janet is responsible, organized, articulate, exceedingly driven, and personable. Other students
defer to her judgment and arguments. I chose her to serve on my undergraduate committee,
which is engaged in an overhaul of our curriculum, for all these reasons. But I have actually
been pleasantly surprised by her work on the committee because of the extent to which she has
been such a forceful advocate for students’ interests. This is not the easiest thing to do—to tell
three professors what they should be doing. From the first day, however, Janet demonstrated the
role she would play, and we quickly came to rely upon her as a vital participant in our
deliberations.
I should note one or two other aspects of Janet’s personality and character as well, in that they
are so public and striking. First, she is aware and involved with contemporary politics, in
particular issues important to youth. Her work to promote voting among college students, her
web broadcasts of the conventions, her active support of the quality team teaching program at
the Mythic Institute for Learning, and her recent involvement with the World Business Dialogue
and World Student Summit all demonstrate, to me, that she has her finger on the pulse of the
college campus, American youth, and increasingly international youth as well. This is an
essential part of how she defines her leadership skills. Second, Janet is wonderfully authentic.
She talks about her accomplishments with joy, her failures with disappointment, and her plans
with enthusiasm. Finally, she is ambitious without seeing herself in competition with others. In a
variety of settings, I have seen her contributions to other students and the larger community.
I believe Janet Lerner is a natural to receive a Mitchell Scholarship. She has a deep and sincere
interest in Irish politics, and her work requires that she study with scholars close to her subject.
Her plan of study strikes me as well-suited to the opportunities the Scholarship presents.
Please contact me if I can provide any additional information.
Sincerely,
John Teacher
John Teacher
Associate Professor
Political Science Honors Coordinator

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September xx, 20xx

The US-Ireland Alliance

To the Mitchell Scholarship Selection Committee:

I am pleased to write in support of Janet Lerner’s application to receive a Mitchell Scholarship.

Please contact me if I can provide any additional information.

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