Recommendations are a required part of our admissions process. While applicants will not be rejected for not submitting their recommenders' contact info prior to their interview, we encourage applicants to submit this information as soon as possible so that recommenders have enough time to fill out the Online Recommendation Form.

Applicants who do not have at least one submitted recommendation form will not receive an offer to join the corps.

Recommenders should be individuals who have supervised your work or have been in a position to guide or evaluate your work within the past 3-5 years.

Our online recommendation form is designed to learn more about how each candidate displays the characteristics we look for. Our form consists of 6-8 short answer response questions, asking your recommenders to reflect on your specific strengths. It typically takes 30 minutes to one hour to complete. 

When asking individuals to serve as your recommenders, you should:

Teach For America does not accept traditional letters of recommendation. Instead, we ask you to submit contact information for two recommenders.

We’re sorry you’re having trouble!

Please email us at RTStaffing@teachforamerica.org so we can help you problem-solve.

Please Note: If you applied for a job at Teach For America prior to May 2013, you will need to reregister with our new system. When you begin your registration, you should still use the same email address you used with our old system.

Please let us know! Email, call, text—we want to hear about it from you. We encourage you to be transparent with us at every step in the process, so we can best accommodate your needs when possible.

Yes! Different positions at TFA may require different skillsets. Candidates who apply for multiple positions will go through more than one hiring process. We will try our best to streamline the interview processes, but we want you to be prepared for the time commitment that may be required if you move forward for multiple positions.

We often don’t know early in the application cycle which locations will be open by the time we interview you. Therefore, it’s crucial that you tell us in your application everywhere that you would consider living so that if openings change throughout the process, we know your complete list of preferences and can get your materials in front of the right hiring managers.

We don't recommend that you apply for both roles, since the skill sets and motivations are separate. We recommend that you take some time to review each role's description and list of responsibilities.

Your hiring manager may also suggest that one role or the other would be a better fit for you during the interview process.