A letter of Intent or LOI is a letter submitted to a school or university stating your intent to enroll by informing them of your educational, athletic, and career background. The letter is used to sell yourself and explain why you out of everyone should be in the program and what that program can do for you.

The basic setup for a letter of intent is as follows and should be written in a proper business format:

Introduce Yourself: Introduce yourself and talk about your extracurricular activities, grades, attendance, test scores, classes, etc. Anything that makes you stand out and shows you know what you are doing and have basic time management skills in place.

Why You are Writing This: Explain why you want to go to this certain school and why this school will help you achieve your goals. It doesn’t hurt to compliment the program.

Conclusion: Reiterate your resume briefly and why you want to go to this school and thank the person you are writing too for their time.

The LOI is really just like any letter and can help be used to guide people who you may ask for a Letter of Recommendation.