Bad Letter of Rec...

[HurricaneKatt]

---

Members do not see this ad.

I am wondering if a bad letter from a previous app cycle can hurt your chances on a more recent app cycle?

Long story short, my undergraduate research/senior thesis did not go well. I had many conflicts with the professor and her graduate student. They very much disliked me no matter how hard I tried to maintain a good, professional relationship and we had some apparent communication issues. It was a nightmare - even my school adviser was astonished. With this in mind, I had absolutely NO intention of asking the professor to write me a letter of rec; however, near the end of the semester the professor OFFERED to write one. I assumed that if she was offering a letter, she must have something good to say and considering she was my research and thesis adviser that it would be unwise to decline, so I said I would be grateful for a letter and thanked her. She sent the letter to the premed adviser who them shipped it off to AMCAS along with my other letters. I got 2 interviews, 0 acceptances.

One of the schools I interviewed at said that next year I should try to get stronger letters of recommendation, and fewer letters. This year, I reapplied to said school and was working with my premed adviser to determine which letters I should send. I needed his opinion (since he can read them and I can't) on which faculty letter was the strongest. He said he would not recommend sending the letter from my thesis adviser as it had some negative comments in it!!!!!!

First off - WHY didn't he mention that the FIRST time around?!?! I have a strong feeling that that may have been a large contributor to my rejection from the one school, as my interview went very well. (I also needed more clinical experience - with the power of the two combined.... *headdesk*). Second off, why would she OFFER to write a letter if she was going to put negative things in it?! I was furious when he said that. At both of them...

Anyways, I took that letter out of my application entirely this cycle. However, so far this cycle is NOT going well. I've improved my application, have much better LORs, more EC,s volunteering, slightly improved GPA (I took one class, all I could afford to), a LOT more clinical experience etc etc etc. Despite this, I have 0 interviews, AND got a rejection from a school I interviewed at last year. I am wondering if the letter would still be on file with the schools I applied to LAST year and whether it could/would hurt me THIS year. If so, what (if anything) can I do to make up for this horrible spot on my app?

 

[IlDestriero]

I

I am wondering if a bad letter from a previous app cycle can hurt your chances on a more recent app cycle?

Long story short, my undergraduate research/senior thesis did not go well. I had many conflicts with the professor and her graduate student. They very much disliked me no matter how hard I tried to maintain a good, professional relationship and we had some apparent communication issues. It was a nightmare - even my school adviser was astonished. With this in mind, I had absolutely NO intention of asking the professor to write me a letter of rec; however, near the end of the semester the professor OFFERED to write one. I assumed that if she was offering a letter, she must have something good to say and considering she was my research and thesis adviser that it would be unwise to decline, so I said I would be grateful for a letter and thanked her. She sent the letter to the premed adviser who them shipped it off to AMCAS along with my other letters. I got 2 interviews, 0 acceptances.

One of the schools I interviewed at said that next year I should try to get stronger letters of recommendation, and fewer letters. This year, I reapplied to said school and was working with my premed adviser to determine which letters I should send. I needed his opinion (since he can read them and I can't) on which faculty letter was the strongest. He said he would not recommend sending the letter from my thesis adviser as it had some negative comments in it!!!!!!

First off - WHY didn't he mention that the FIRST time around?!?! I have a strong feeling that that may have been a large contributor to my rejection from the one school, as my interview went very well. (I also needed more clinical experience - with the power of the two combined.... *headdesk*). Second off, why would she OFFER to write a letter if she was going to put negative things in it?! I was furious when he said that. At both of them...

Anyways, I took that letter out of my application entirely this cycle. However, so far this cycle is NOT going well. I've improved my application, have much better LORs, more EC,s volunteering, slightly improved GPA (I took one class, all I could afford to), a LOT more clinical experience etc etc etc. Despite this, I have 0 interviews, AND got a rejection from a school I interviewed at last year. I am wondering if the letter would still be on file with the schools I applied to LAST year and whether it could/would hurt me THIS year. If so, what (if anything) can I do to make up for this horrible spot on my app?

Some people are vindictive bastards who deserve to be knee capped. There's one jackhole at the NIH who I'm waiting to die so I can fly out to piss on his grave. Having said that, you were a fool to accept a LOR from someone who you knew you had a conflict with. I would never have accepted anything from my pal in Bethesda, except perhaps a request to break his jaw. I doubt anyone would remember you from the thousands that applied last year, except if they interviewed you or specifically discussed your lor at the committee meeting.
Your advisor is also a world class douche for reading your negative letter and not "suggesting" that you have enough letters without using his, or not reading them at all.
You have to be very careful about who you trust with writing your letters of recommendation and, in the future, who you trust with employment change information. Your future employer might be pretty unhappy to see you go. I've seen that as well.
Some normal appearing folks are real bastards when things don't work out the way they imagined in the semi-fantasy world in their head.

 

[pasiley]

I'm sorry that happened to you. 🙁

I do think there is more to this than just your bad letter though. If the letter had sunk your application, you would be doing much better without it.

Did you apply early? To the right schools -- to enough schools? Did you properly address your lack of clinical experience?

I wouldn't dwell on it, that jack ass will always be an ass and probably lives a miserable life.

 

[theseeker4]

Some people are vindictive bastards who deserve to be knee capped. There's one jackhole at the NIH who I'm waiting to die so I can fly out to piss on his grave. Having said that, you were a fool to accept a LOR from someone who you knew you had a conflict with. I would never have accepted anything from my pal in Bethesda, except perhaps a request to break his jaw. I doubt anyone would remember you from the thousands that applied last year, except if they interviewed you or specifically discussed your lor at the committee meeting.
Your advisor is also a world class douche for reading your negative letter and not "suggesting" that you have enough letters without using his, or not reading them at all.

One caveat, applying to the same schools as last year, they very well might pull your app from last cycle to compare with your new app. This means those schools very likely will see your LORs from last year, despite the fact that you are right, they won't remember an applicant from last year. New schools won't have access to last year's LORs of course.

 

[911 Turbo]

I'd go to his office and say "**** you ********er" and just walk out. It will make you feel better.

 

[HurricaneKatt]

One caveat, applying to the same schools as last year, they very well might pull your app from last cycle to compare with your new app. This means those schools very likely will see your LORs from last year, despite the fact that you are right, they won't remember an applicant from last year. New schools won't have access to last year's LORs of course.

That's what I am worried about. My top choice is a school that I applied to last year. I reapplied to a few other schools as well.

I'm sorry that happened to you. 🙁

I do think there is more to this than just your bad letter though. If the letter had sunk your application, you would be doing much better without it.

Did you apply early? To the right schools -- to enough schools? Did you properly address your lack of clinical experience?

I wouldn't dwell on it, that jack ass will always be an ass and probably lives a miserable life.

Last cycle I applied late, which really did me in I feel like. This year though I applied pretty early. I have a 3.7 GPA, 31 MCAT, a Lot of EC's (including working all through undergrad), lots of volunteering in medical and non-medical areas, tutoring, research experience, I work in a medical office, and I have shadowed surgery, peds, and family med. I applied to 16 schools. I chose schools that fit my numbers and had relatively high rates of OOS acceptance. So far I have 3 rejections and one silent rejection (no secondary). One rejection was to one of my 2 top picks, and a school I interviewed at last year. They told me get more clinical experience (I more than doubled my shadowing hours, plus working in a health clinic), and stronger letters of rec (UUUGGGHHH!!!!) which I did (brand new ones from people I very much trust to write good letters, one I even got to read).

I

Some people are vindictive bastards who deserve to be knee capped. There's one jackhole at the NIH who I'm waiting to die so I can fly out to piss on his grave. Having said that, you were a fool to accept a LOR from someone who you knew you had a conflict with. I would never have accepted anything from my pal in Bethesda, except perhaps a request to break his jaw. I doubt anyone would remember you from the thousands that applied last year, except if they interviewed you or specifically discussed your lor at the committee meeting.
Your advisor is also a world class douche for reading your negative letter and not "suggesting" that you have enough letters without using his, or not reading them at all.
You have to be very careful about who you trust with writing your letters of recommendation and, in the future, who you trust with employment change information. Your future employer might be pretty unhappy to see you go. I've seen that as well.
Some normal appearing folks are real bastards when things don't work out the way they imagined in the semi-fantasy world in their head.

Ugh I know I shouldn't have accepted but I felt like if she was offering she must have something good to say. Because who would Offer to write a letter of RECOMMENDATION, and then say bad things?!?! I guess I just trust people to have good intentions too much.... 👎(

 

[LizzyM]

I, too, was betrayed by someone who offered a letter of recommendation and then set me back a year. It hurts.

Until recently, I believed that it was too much trouble to dig old applications out of the file room but now that they are electronic, it is possilble for the head of the admissions office to pull up the previous year's application in just a few seconds. So, it is much easier now for your past to haunt you and some people, I've found, have minds like a steel trap when it comes to remembering names of weak applicants. (I never even look at their names, just their credentials.)

Some schools do tend to reject applicants the first time around and encourage them to reapply (I'm thinking of one state school in the South that routinely tells applicants to get a year of clinical experience before reapplying.) but in other cases it might be a good practice to apply to different schools in a reapplication year.

 

[SilverCat]

I really do believe that, for the most part, schools that reject you the first cycle consider you a second-class applicant in the second cycle. I've received no invites from schools I applied to last cycle, and fast rejections at two of the schools at which I interviewed.

At some schools, if you mess up once, you aren't given a second chance, no matter how much you improve your credentials. There are just too many good candidates to consider you again, and living in the electronic age, it's very easy to find out if you were weak at one point. You may as well have serious institutional action recorded on your file.

That's why I'm terrified that if this cycle continues as it has been going for me, I basically have lost all hope of becoming a doctor, other than going Caribbean, which is unfeasible.

 

[Geebeejay]

I am wondering if a bad letter from a previous app cycle can hurt your chances on a more recent app cycle?

Long story short, my undergraduate research/senior thesis did not go well. I had many conflicts with the professor and her graduate student. They very much disliked me no matter how hard I tried to maintain a good, professional relationship and we had some apparent communication issues. It was a nightmare - even my school adviser was astonished. With this in mind, I had absolutely NO intention of asking the professor to write me a letter of rec; however, near the end of the semester the professor OFFERED to write one. I assumed that if she was offering a letter, she must have something good to say and considering she was my research and thesis adviser that it would be unwise to decline, so I said I would be grateful for a letter and thanked her. She sent the letter to the premed adviser who them shipped it off to AMCAS along with my other letters. I got 2 interviews, 0 acceptances.

One of the schools I interviewed at said that next year I should try to get stronger letters of recommendation, and fewer letters. This year, I reapplied to said school and was working with my premed adviser to determine which letters I should send. I needed his opinion (since he can read them and I can't) on which faculty letter was the strongest. He said he would not recommend sending the letter from my thesis adviser as it had some negative comments in it!!!!!!

First off - WHY didn't he mention that the FIRST time around?!?! I have a strong feeling that that may have been a large contributor to my rejection from the one school, as my interview went very well. (I also needed more clinical experience - with the power of the two combined.... *headdesk*). Second off, why would she OFFER to write a letter if she was going to put negative things in it?! I was furious when he said that. At both of them...

Anyways, I took that letter out of my application entirely this cycle. However, so far this cycle is NOT going well. I've improved my application, have much better LORs, more EC,s volunteering, slightly improved GPA (I took one class, all I could afford to), a LOT more clinical experience etc etc etc. Despite this, I have 0 interviews, AND got a rejection from a school I interviewed at last year. I am wondering if the letter would still be on file with the schools I applied to LAST year and whether it could/would hurt me THIS year. If so, what (if anything) can I do to make up for this horrible spot on my app?

Wow, that sucks...in retrospect, you probably shouldn't have gotten a letter from someone you didn't get along with, but that's pretty manipulative that she offered to write one, and then wrote a ****ty one. I guess you really can't beat yourself up for that one.

If you get accepted eventually, make sure you show your professor your acceptance letter, and tell her to suck it.

 

[Owlie]

What a horrible person. The best course of action is to forgive them and move on, doing your best this app cycle as you have been.

 

[iave9963]

It happens man, like everyone was saying you just have to move forward. I remember asking one of my bio professors for a letter and she said "oh sure yes of course." About a month before the semester ended, she called me in and told me she wrote my letter but had to include a few negative things about me (sitting in the back of class the week I was sick, missing lab that same week.) She smiled and asked did I want the letter, I looked at her and then . Needless to say people are douches for no apparent reason sometimes. Just have to roll with the punches, after swearing up a storm of course 🙂. Good luck with the rest of this cycle.

 

[HurricaneKatt]

I, too, was betrayed by someone who offered a letter of recommendation and then set me back a year. It hurts.

Until recently, I believed that it was too much trouble to dig old applications out of the file room but now that they are electronic, it is possilble for the head of the admissions office to pull up the previous year's application in just a few seconds. So, it is much easier now for your past to haunt you and some people, I've found, have minds like a steel trap when it comes to remembering names of weak applicants. (I never even look at their names, just their credentials.)

Some schools do tend to reject applicants the first time around and encourage them to reapply (I'm thinking of one state school in the South that routinely tells applicants to get a year of clinical experience before reapplying.) but in other cases it might be a good practice to apply to different schools in a reapplication year.

The one school I interviewed at last year hinted very, VERY strongly that if I fixed the spots in my app that they thought were weak, I was pretty much in. Obviously I didn't take that as I don't have to compete against the other applicants, but I DID take that as "we look highly on reapplicants that listen to what we told them and reapply, showing they are truly interested in our school...."
That is good to know for next cycle though if I have to reapply again. I will probably continue to apply to my top 2, Reno and WWAMI, but I'll pick only schools I haven't applied to for my other options... Hopefully it doesn't come to that though. I still have several schools waiting.

 

[Lollygag]

It happens man, like everyone was saying you just have to move forward. I remember asking one of my bio professors for a letter and she said "oh sure yes of course." About a month before the semester ended, she called me in and told me she wrote my letter but had to include a few negative things about me (sitting in the back of class the week I was sick, missing lab that same week.) She smiled and asked did I want the letter, I looked at her and then . Needless to say people are douches for no apparent reason sometimes. Just have to roll with the punches, after swearing up a storm of course 🙂. Good luck with the rest of this cycle.

😕😕😕 I just don't understand lol but at least she told you. I'm going to be uber careful with rec letters lol

I wonder if it would help if maybe instead of asking for a letter of recommendation, you ask for a POSITIVE recommendation letter? Emphasis on the POSITIVE. lol one of my advisors told us to always say positive recommendation letter instead of just recommendation letter and to never say reference letter because a reference letter could hint at either negative or positive.

 

[Sophocles]

This is truly horrible. Basically, that person went out of their way to hinder you from getting into medical school.

Hope things brighten up for you. Sorry to hear about your misfortunes.

 

[ValentineLissar]

I'm sorry to hear about your blight. Have you considered DO schools?

 

[HurricaneKatt]

It happens man, like everyone was saying you just have to move forward. I remember asking one of my bio professors for a letter and she said "oh sure yes of course." About a month before the semester ended, she called me in and told me she wrote my letter but had to include a few negative things about me (sitting in the back of class the week I was sick, missing lab that same week.) She smiled and asked did I want the letter, I looked at her and then . Needless to say people are douches for no apparent reason sometimes. Just have to roll with the punches, after swearing up a storm of course 🙂. Good luck with the rest of this cycle.

Wow...at least she told you I guess. 😕 I just do NOT understand some people! Like why did she even waste her time writing the letter in the first place? She could have just said "I don't feel that I can write you a positive letter" and saved herself the time and you the trouble. It will never make sense to me why some people are just so malicious... 🙁

I'm sorry to hear about your blight. Have you considered DO schools?

I really want to go the MD route. That being said, if I don't get in this year, I will apply to some DO schools next year.

 

[IslandStyle808]

i

some people are vindictive bastards who deserve to be knee capped. There's one jackhole at the nih who i'm waiting to die so i can fly out to piss on his grave. Having said that, you were a fool to accept a lor from someone who you knew you had a conflict with. I would never have accepted anything from my pal in bethesda, except perhaps a request to break his jaw. I doubt anyone would remember you from the thousands that applied last year, except if they interviewed you or specifically discussed your lor at the committee meeting.
Your advisor is also a world class douche for reading your negative letter and not "suggesting" that you have enough letters without using his, or not reading them at all.
You have to be very careful about who you trust with writing your letters of recommendation and, in the future, who you trust with employment change information. Your future employer might be pretty unhappy to see you go. I've seen that as well.
Some normal appearing folks are real bastards when things don't work out the way they imagined in the semi-fantasy world in their head.

+1000

 

[jl lin]

That's what I am worried about. My top choice is a school that I applied to last year. I reapplied to a few other schools as well.



Last cycle I applied late, which really did me in I feel like. This year though I applied pretty early. I have a 3.7 GPA, 31 MCAT, a Lot of EC's (including working all through undergrad), lots of volunteering in medical and non-medical areas, tutoring, research experience, I work in a medical office, and I have shadowed surgery, peds, and family med. I applied to 16 schools. I chose schools that fit my numbers and had relatively high rates of OOS acceptance. So far I have 3 rejections and one silent rejection (no secondary). One rejection was to one of my 2 top picks, and a school I interviewed at last year. They told me get more clinical experience (I more than doubled my shadowing hours, plus working in a health clinic), and stronger letters of rec (UUUGGGHHH!!!!) which I did (brand new ones from people I very much trust to write good letters, one I even got to read).




Ugh I know I shouldn't have accepted but I felt like if she was offering she must have something good to say. Because who would Offer to write a letter of RECOMMENDATION, and then say bad things?!?! I guess I just trust people to have good intentions too much.... 👎(

People who are insecure, nasty, and spiteful--and have no problem with operating that way. That's who. Some people can be &😡$s. No worries. In due time, it comes back to them. I've lived to see it a good number of times now. Reciprocity, karma, whatever...it can be a real b,?@!.

But I also agree with the poster who said forgive them. Yes what goes around does come back around, but resentment is like one of those deep pimples that won't come to a head...or worse. It hurts you, and it doesn't help you or the other person to be better people.

To the op, I hope you hear good news. Don't give up. 🙂

 

[iave9963]

Wow...at least she told you I guess. 😕 I just do NOT understand some people! Like why did she even waste her time writing the letter in the first place? She could have just said "I don't feel that I can write you a positive letter" and saved herself the time and you the trouble. It will never make sense to me why some people are just so malicious... 🙁

Malicious indeed, so I can sort of understand where the OP is coming from. Just imagine what would've happened if she never told me. I would've been F***ed!

 

[HurricaneKatt]

Malicious indeed, so I can sort of understand where the OP is coming from. Just imagine what would've happened if she never told me. I would've been F***ed!

Seeing as how I AM the OP 😉 I don't need to imagine.... 🙁 😛😉 I'm glad she told you! Maybe she just didn't write it...and was screwing with you saying that so she didn't have to... 😱

 

[iave9963]

Seeing as how I AM the OP 😉 I don't need to imagine.... 🙁 😛😉 I'm glad she told you! Maybe she just didn't write it...and was screwing with you saying that so she didn't have to... 😱

I thought about this a lot, and came to the conclusion that you will never know why people do the things they do. Sorry about your situation. Here's to hoping you bounce back from this