Supplying references is one of the most crucial steps in the university application process. It’s important to select academic referees who can speak to your capabilities and strengths and can highlight your achievements. For this reason, it’s important that you select the ones who are the most suitable to do so, who know you and your motivations and who have first-hand experience teaching you.

Firstly, one thing that you should remember when choosing prospective referees is that they should have personal experience teaching or supervising you to be able to speak about you effectively. Which is why you should pick a teacher you have had regular interactions with. You would benefit more if your academic referee is a teacher who taught you a subject that’s relevant to your master’s course instead of the head of the department you studied in. When I was deciding on who my academic referees would be, I chose a teacher with whom I had the best rapport with, who had taught me over three years and had seen me grow as a student. It was also important to me that my academic referee had taught me a subject that was relevant to the master’s program I wanted to pursue.

Second, for students who have been out of university for a while and have lost touch with their teachers, it can be a bit more difficult to ask for references. I suggest reaching out to them and perhaps asking to meet in-person. An in-person conversation or a phone call can be a much better way to tell them about your plans for your master’s application and help them catch up on what you have been doing since you graduated from your previous university. As someone who was applying for a master’s degree five years after graduating, I knew it would be difficult reconnecting with my old professors over email. I made it a point to call my prospective referees and update them on my journey so far. I then followed up with an official email to both of them requesting them to provide academic references with specific details on when my application was due and some information about the program I was applying to.

Also, reach out to your prospective referees well in advance. I would suggest approaching them three months in advance. Come application season, professors almost always get busy writing references for multiple students and it can be very helpful to reach out to them earlier and make sure they have the capacity to write a reference for you. It’s also important to ensure your academic referees know every important milestone and achievement in your life. They can then include this in the reference that they write and build a better profile for you.

Lastly, supply all the important information on the format of the references, how they would need to be shared with the university, when they need to be uploaded and any other specific requirements that the university has asked for. Your referees should have all the information they need to upload the references successfully so that there are no delays in your application being processed.

Learn more about the requirements for submission of academic references.