When choosing a professor to write a letter for you, how recent should they be? Is it more important to chose someone who can write a strong letter for you that is from over 2-3 years ago or someone who can write a regular letter that is more recent as in one academic quarter ago?

I am able to have a really fantastic LOR from a professor I took for 5 semesters in community college (lots of math). I mean he really knows me well both academically and personally, but the last time I took a class from him was in Spring 2007. I would be applying to schools in Summer of 2010. Is this too old? I have another professor (at the University level) who would write me one but I took that class in Winter of 2009. Is this one also too outdated? The professor from Winter 2009 would write a good one as well, but definitely not as strong since I knew her only for 10 weeks. What do you guys think? I know many schools require more than one letter from professors but I was just wondering if the letters from professors I had in CC may be 1) too outdated and 2) looked down upon because of they would be from CC.

Did you guys feel the letters held important weight in your application? (of course they are important since they are asked of us during the application process but how strong do they really have to be from a professor) Were they mentioned in an interview? Anyone have CC professors write for you?

Any opinion or experience would be much appreciated.

I think the letters are very important. I only have my opinion here - I'm certainly not an adcom member, and don't claim to know how they think.

I don't think it is relevant that your instructor is from a community college, especially if this person has an advanced degree. I had some PhD instructors at cc, and some MS. It seems like a PhD would be preferable, but I think the most important factor is having an instructor who got to know you in class and has the teaching experience to distinguish a good student from a bad student. My only additional advice on that point is to get the letter now and have the school hold it for you, if you have a committee that does things like that.

I think I had three professor letters, and they ranged from people who had known me a long time, to people I'd had only a couple of classes with. I also had two doctor letters and two employer letters. The doctor letters (according to one of the doctors) are the most important thing. A doctor I shadowed said that medicine is like a big club, and you need another club member to vouch for you if you want membership. Don't know if that's true, but that was his opinion!

Strong LORs hands down but IF they can be "recent" that is best. As an adcom I rarely looked at the date of the LOR>