bad situation with LOR writer and next steps

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blue2014

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So at this point in time, there isn't much I can do about the situation except to just wait and see what happened but I think the only way is to move forward and prepare for next cycle.

So the situation started when I was volunteering at my local ED. There was one of the nurses whom I never met who filed a compliant against me saying that I was "just sitting around and doing nothing". But the problem is that the ED can sometimes be quiet with nothing to do and this is one of those times so I sat on a clean stretcher in the ED area (like a lot of the staff do sometimes) waiting for further instructions. When I was terminated a lot of the nursing and support staff disagreed with that nurse who filed the compliant to the volunteer coordinator. They decided to called/paged the coordinator and sent a letter on my behalf to try to get me un-terminated which in effect pissed the coordinator even more so the day after this situation, they called my pre med advisor and had the LOR they wrote pulled from all the schools I applied to. I have notified all my schools after the LOR was pulled and has written a letter explaining the situation as per their suggestion.

So I am wondering if this situation has happened to anyone and if any of you guys have any suggestions on what to do for the next cycle to address this situation and make myself a better candidate. I wouldn't have a LOR from that hospital next cycle so they don't have any letter they can pull next time around.

here are my stats:
MCAT: 25 BS 8, PS 8, VR 9 (planning on taking the new MCAT in April)
overall GPA: 3.5 Science GPA: 3.5
undergrad GPA: 3.44, Post Bacc: 3.75

EC:
-2 years EMT volunteer,
-1.5 year volunteer with social work type NGO,
-1 year of ED volunteer (this thing that I was terminated from)
 
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Sorry to hear that :/ that's not a good situation to be in.

What I am wondering is what this LOR is, is this a committee letter?

Were you accepted anywhere this cycle?
 
it was just a regular LOR, I applied late this cycle which made my situation worse.... I haven't had any acceptances yet just 2 rejections.
 
I apologize that this has happened to you :/. Does your school have a letter of recommendation service that you used? Addendum: I only ask because you said this was a regular LOR
 
Nope, my pre med office receives the LOR and send it out to AMCAS and the DO schools.
 
Is it possible to delete a letter after it has been submitted to AMCAS?
 
Ohh ok gotcha. I'll bump the first part of your question, but I will ask now if any of the schools you applied to absolutely NEED this withdrawn LOR? I noted you had 2 years as an EMT volunteer and 1.5 years in Social work type NGO. Did you by chance have letters from them this cycle?
Or are you more worried about what other schools may think about your LOR being withdrawn with your explanation?
 
Since that LOR isn't a required LOR my file will still move forward to the committee but according to the my advisor this is really bad and a big red flag. I got an LOR from the NGO but not the EMT volunteer experience. My only concern is about how it looks like to the committee that this happened. I have done all I could to explain the hell out of the situation but it is the waiting that is killing me. I guess I am just venting and seeing if this is as unique of a situation as my advisor made it sound.
 
blue2014 said:
Since that LOR isn't a required LOR my file will still move forward to the committee but according to the my advisor this is really bad and a big red flag. I got an LOR from the NGO but not the EMT volunteer experience. My only concern is about how it looks like to the committee that this happened. I have done all I could to explain the hell out of the situation but it is the waiting that is killing me. I guess I am just venting and seeing if this is as unique of a situation as my advisor made it sound.
Click to expand...

This is one of those things that I feel like you've done you best to soften to blow to. You've explained the situation but there's not going back with the LOR being pulled. I'm guessing that all schools already have a hard copy of the LOR so even if they pull it from Interfolio or what not then they may still have it on file?
 
I would assume the med school still have the letter on file even though it was pulled. I have asked my pre med office to destroy their copy so it cannot accidentally be resend.
 
So any advice on what to do for the next application cycle? I know that since this is a significant event and a red flag, it will stay with me every time I applied. If I didn't get the LOR and was just plain old terminated, it could have been overlooked but now there is a record of this happening and my pre med advisor knows what happened so I know this issue is going to come back and bite me whether I like it so any advice on how to soften the blow next time around?
 
well the coordinator took the nurse's side of the story and basically told me that I was terminated. I no longer have any connection with the people working there (like contact info) so that is kind of hard to get an LOR from them....

I mean if I heard about them pulling the LOR I would have tried to get the nurses to write an LOR but in the moment I just assumed that they were going to just let me go and not doing anything about the LOR, otherwise I would have gotten the nurses to write another LOR to give to the med schools. It was only a day after the termination that they decided to pull out the letter and so I was basically unprepared for the fact.
 
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sb247 said:
I feel like there has to be more to the story
Click to expand...

There clearly is. Obviously you asked those other people to basically harass the volunteer coordinator with calls and pages. I'm sure you realize now that was a bad move. Also blatantly sitting around looking bored is not good. You should at least pretend to be busy or just taking laps around the ED looking for ways to be useful. Finally a letter from a volunteer office is as generic as they get. Literally the only personal things in there are your name and number of volunteer hours. Poor decision to include it in your app.
 
In my ER, I don't have very much interaction with our volunteers, but they are a big help with cleaning/stocking supplies. I can't help but wonder why a nurse would want to go out of there way to screw with you like that. I can't say I like all of our volunteers (the ones I know), but it sounds like way too much work to get them in trouble for "not doing anything", they're volunteers for gods sake. As long as they don't get in the way and/or hurt patients it wouldn't be worth the thought, much less my time to get them in trouble.

I hope you are able to get over this hump. It'd would be a shame for something this trivial to harm your chances.
 
Just for clarification purposes so I can understand this a little more...you applied to schools, sent in your LORs, and then then asked to get thatLOR pulled (after schools all received it)??
1) can they really "un-upload" a LOR from interfolio like that?
2) wouldn't the schools already have the LOR anyways so it getting pulled shouldnt matter right...and they wouldn't know it was pulled anyways, right?
 
Something about using a pre med advisor's "letter service" makes me feel uncomfortable.
To be honest I didn't think people could actually use that, but then again my school specifically refused such services for "political reasons." Now I see what they meant by that..
 
The Lor was pulled by my pre med advisor at the request from the volunteer coordinator after I submitted my apps and my pre med office submitted my LORs. My pre med office has all the LORs and they don't use interfolio. I would assume the med school has the Lor still even though it was pulled.
 
OP, let me say that from a personal standpoint I don't judge either way what happened. I know some bad people can do stuff like what you describe from the nurse/volunteering director, but I also know some people like make their side of a story more favorable than reality. However, from an admissions point of view, I consider this to be a strong blow to your application no matter how you slice it. There's always that doubt as to how bad things "really" were if they took an action to pull an LOR. I do think you'll most likely be re-applying, and I would recommend you apply mainly to colleges where there isn't a file saying they pulled an LOR.

Good luck.
 
blue2014 said:
The Lor was pulled by my pre med advisor at the request from the volunteer coordinator after I submitted my apps and my pre med office submitted my LORs. My pre med office has all the LORs and they don't use interfolio. I would assume the med school has the Lor still even though it was pulled.
Click to expand...

Is your pre-med advisor siding with you at this point? I think this will be critical when explaining the situation to the medical schools.
 
My pre med advisor was angry when it first happened because she was the one who had to make all the calls to the med school but a week later she agreed that it was a misunderstanding and eventually wrote a clarification letter to send to the med schools.
 
Thanks guys and gals for the advice. There isn't much that can be done with the situation this cycle and I have accepted the fact that I might not get an interview or acceptances this cycle. I can only move forward and hope I can put this behind me next cycle.
 
I have seen so many techs/nurses "not doing anything" for periods of time in the ED. Looks like you just got really unlucky, OP. Just roll with the punches and try to always be on everyone's good side in any professional environment from now on.
 
How do you get fired from a volunteer position? I do hope there's more to this story. What the hell do they expect volunteers to be doing?

That being said, some people have nothing better to do with their lives than cause drama. Lesson learned, always watch your back and trust no one.
 
Deep breaths. No one here knows what each individual admissions officer is going to say about it. Clearly, it won't be bonus points, but some may not think anything of it. Just have a truthful story prepped. Be mature about it. It happened. You didn't have control over it. Let it go. People on these boards speculate crazy stuff b/c the whole black box process is frightening. I don't think an admissions committee gives much of a damn about a letter from the volunteer coordinator at an emergency room. I'm open to being wrong, but in the litany of things they can evaluate, that one seems of little value, especially given that those people rarely even have the exposure to evaluate your work.
 
I will say this may be nothing more than an unhappy, vindictive nurse. As a doctor I was in a job that I resigned from because the nurse manager conspired to have me terminated (I found this out after it was all done) who went to the CEO stating that I was mean and cussing at the nurses on the floor. The CEO took her side and laid into me with screaming and cussing about how I wasn't going to cut it, etc. blah,blah,blah. Sometimes you have to cut your losses and move on when you didn't do anything wrong in the first place.

When I got into medical school my mentor who was a nurse for 18 years before going to medical school told me once that "nurses are the only species who will eat their young to save themselves." Now they are not all like that as I have many nurse friends. However, once you have been targeted, it's over.

And word of advice, don't ever sit on a clean bed or exam table, they have to clean it again before the next patient.
 
cabinbuilder said:
I will say this may be nothing more than an unhappy, vindictive nurse. As a doctor I was in a job that I resigned from because the nurse manager conspired to have me terminated (I found this out after it was all done) who went to the CEO stating that I was mean and cussing at the nurses on the floor. The CEO took her side and laid into me with screaming and cussing about how I wasn't going to cut it, etc. blah,blah,blah. Sometimes you have to cut your losses and move on when you didn't do anything wrong in the first place.

When I got into medical school my mentor who was a nurse for 18 years before going to medical school told me once that "nurses are the only species who will eat their young to save themselves." Now they are not all like that as I have many nurse friends. However, once you have been targeted, it's over.

And word of advice, don't ever sit on a clean bed or exam table, they have to clean it again before the next patient.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry to hear that this happened to you OP, especially after you had been volunteering there for a while. For people who are saying there must be more to this story - not necessarily. There truly are nasty people out there who want to cause drama and make others look bad for no real reason. I've seen it happen.

Since you applied so late this year, that probably hurt your app the most. Apply early next year, get a new LOR, and apply to schools that don't know about this (although I'm sure there are some schools that really won't care about this issue)
 
I would file a complaint against the volunteer coordinator with her superior for not properly investigating and taking drastic improper action.

That and very public google and yelp reviews stating they strongarm and bully the help.
 
Imnotfromjersey said:
I would file a complaint against the volunteer coordinator with her superior for not properly investigating and taking drastic improper action.

That and very public google and yelp reviews stating they strongarm and bully the help.
Click to expand...
Wrong plan, wash your hands of this place and move on
 
Imnotfromjersey said:
I would file a complaint against the volunteer coordinator with her superior for not properly investigating and taking drastic improper action.

That and very public google and yelp reviews stating they strongarm and bully the help.
Click to expand...
Absolutely don't do any of these things
 
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