Parent Brag Sheet Examples — What Counselors Use

Parent Brag Sheet Examples: What to Write and What Counselors Actually Use

A parent brag sheet is a questionnaire you fill out so your child's school counselor can write a specific recommendation. The strong answers are short, concrete stories the counselor could not see at school; the weak ones are adjectives and pride.

This page covers the sheet itself: the official questions, how to answer them, and where your answers end up. For the counselor's own forms and what else you can influence, see our companion guide to what the counselor recommendation says.

What the Common App Family Brag Sheet asks

Many high schools use their own version, so ask your counselor which form they want. If they have none, the Common App publishes a "Family questionnaire for counselor letter of recommendation" in its first-year toolkit (the current PDF is dated 2025; retrieved September 24, 2026). Its instructions to you:

"This form is for family members to fill out. Complete this form to help your student's counselor write a letter of recommendation on their behalf. Keep in mind, the more specific the details you can give, the more personal and effective your student's recommendation will be. Anecdotes are very helpful."

After name, relation and contact fields, the questions are, verbatim:

1. "List three adjectives you would use to describe your student"
2. "What makes your student unique? Consider sharing a characteristic or accomplishment that we might not know about or won't see on their academic or activity record."
3. "List some activities your student enjoys."
4. "How do you view your student's academic progress up to this point?"
5. "What do you believe to be your student's strengths (academic and personal)?"
6. "What do you believe to be your student's weaknesses (academic and personal)?"
7. "How does your student react to setbacks? Can you provide an example of a time your student overcame an obstacle or adversity and demonstrated strength, courage, or resiliency?"
8. "List any events or experiences you feel have significantly influenced your student."
9. "List any special circumstances that may affect where your student may apply/attend college."
10. "Additional information. Use this space to share any additional information about your student, including specific examples or stories that highlight your student's character. What hopes do you have for your student's college experience?"

Your child fills out a separate student questionnaire. Yours is valuable because it covers home, not school.

Why specifics beat praise: where your answers go

The sheet is written for the counselor, not for colleges. The counselor uses it to complete their own submissions. The Common App counselor recommendation (2025–26 form) asks:

• "How long have you known this student and in what context?"
• "What are the first words that come to your mind to describe this student?"
• A "short evaluation (1000 words or less) that will help colleges differentiate this student from others," including "academic, extracurricular, and personal characteristics" and "relevant context for the student's performance and involvement, such as particularities of family situation or after-school obligations."

The counselor's School Report also asks them to rate your child against classmates on academic achievements, extracurricular accomplishments, and "personal qualities and character."

The operative word is differentiate. A counselor writing letters for a whole class needs one true detail they can build a paragraph around. "Hardworking" does not differentiate anyone.

Constructed examples: weak vs strong answers

These are constructed examples written for this guide. They do not describe a real student.

Q1. Three adjectives

• Weak: "Brilliant, driven, kind."
• Strong: "Stubborn (in a good way), funny, protective. She once spent a weekend rebuilding a cheap bike because the store said it couldn't be fixed. Then she taught her brother to ride it."

The strong answer gives the counselor an adjective and the evidence, which is what an admissions reader trusts.

Q2. What makes your student unique

• Weak: "He is a natural leader who excels at everything he tries."
• Strong: "He keeps a notebook of questions he can't answer yet. It's on its fourth volume. Most are about why buses in our town run late. He emailed the transit office twice and got a reply the second time."

Q6. Weaknesses

• Weak: "Honestly, none. Maybe she works too hard."
• Strong: "She avoids asking for help until she's stuck for days. It cost her a grade in chemistry in 10th grade. This year she started going to office hours on Tuesdays without being asked."

Answer this one. A believable weakness with a direction of change is more useful to the counselor than a humblebrag, and the counselor form itself expects balanced context.

Q7. Setbacks

• Weak: "He handles setbacks very well and never gives up."
• Strong: "When he was cut from the varsity team as a junior, he stayed on as team manager, kept the stats spreadsheet, and was the first one at practice. He was miserable for a week and told us so."

Q9. Special circumstances

• Weak: (left blank because it feels private)
• Strong: "Since last fall she has picked up her two younger siblings from school four days a week because of my work schedule. That's why she dropped a club in 11th grade."

This answer often matters most, because the counselor form asks directly about "after-school obligations" and family situation. You decide what to share; see the next section.

What not to put on a brag sheet

• Anything untrue or inflated. The Common App's fraud policy covers "materially misleading letters of recommendation," and your sheet is raw material for one.
• Private details your child doesn't want shared. Ask them first. If something is sensitive (health, family changes), tell the counselor what they may and may not include, in writing.
• A draft letter. The counselor writes the letter. Your job is facts and stories; their job is judgment and comparison with the class.
• The essay topic. The brag sheet is your voice; the personal essay must be your child's. Don't use the sheet to plan the essay for them.
• Test scores and GPA. The counselor already has the transcript.

Your brag sheet procedure this week

1. Ask the counselor which form they use and the deadline. The Common App advises students to ask recommenders "at least three weeks in advance of a deadline."
2. Collect three stories before writing: one about how your child thinks, one about how they treat people, one about a setback.
3. Draft each answer in two to four sentences: claim, then the story, then (if you know it) what changed.
4. Ask your child to read your draft. Remove anything they don't want shared; fix anything they say is wrong.
5. Answer the weakness question honestly and briefly.
6. Use the special-circumstances box for obligations or changes that explain the record, if your child agrees.
7. Submit it on time and stop. Don't follow up with extra praise.

Where your child's own story goes

Your brag sheet feeds the counselor's letter; your child's own background and identity story belongs in their essay, in their words (the 2026–27 Common App prompts are the same seven as last year). When they have a draft, your child (not you) can run it through GradPilot's free review against the Common App background and identity rubric, then read the feedback with you. The free review gives qualitative feedback; it does not predict admission, and it does not write or edit essays. More on the Common App rubric set and the college essay review.

For the line between a parent's words and the student's, see how much parents should help with the college essay.

The brag sheet is separate from the application's own family questions; for those, see the Common App family section guide.

FAQ

Do colleges see the parent brag sheet?

The Common App form tells you it is to "help your student's counselor write a letter of recommendation." It is not among the school forms the Common App lists for counselors (School Report, counselor recommendation, mid-year, optional and final reports), so write it for the counselor. Ask your school if its process differs.

How long should brag sheet answers be?

Short enough that a counselor can lift one detail from each answer: two to four sentences, with one anecdote. The form's own advice is that specific details and anecdotes are what make the recommendation "more personal and effective."

Should I mention hardship on the brag sheet?

Only with your child's agreement, and only what's true and relevant. The counselor form asks for context "either positive or negative," including family situation and after-school obligations, so a counselor who knows about a real constraint can explain it. How your child writes about it in the essay is separate; see our hardship essay guide.

Can I use AI to write the brag sheet?

Your answers should be your own observations of your child. The counselor needs stories only you know; a generic, generated paragraph gives them nothing to use. For how AI is treated in the application itself, see our Common App fraud policy breakdown.

Sources

• Common App, Brag sheet: Family questionnaire for counselor letter of recommendation (© 2025; retrieved 2026-09-24)
• Common App, First-year toolkit (retrieved 2026-09-24)
• Common App, Counselor recommendation form, 2025–26 print preview (hosted by Harvard College; retrieved 2026-09-24)
• Common App, School Report, 2025–26 print preview (hosted by Harvard College; retrieved 2026-09-24)
• Common App, Understanding the recommendation process (© 2025; retrieved 2026-09-24)
• Common App, Fraud Policy (retrieved 2026-09-24)