Chasing LOR's

[woolie]

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Has anyone else had the problem of having a great letter of reference person tell you how much they love you, support you and would do anything for you, and then their letter of Reference never makes it to the pile?

One of my BEST volunteer experiences in the Hospital I spent a year and a half (almost) at has just not come through. He was so enthusiastice and supportive last Summer that I thought the letter was sitting their all Fall until I checked last week: no letter.

This guy is so hard to track down, and nail down but this is my best clinical LOR. I just hate having to go back and chase people down and this guy does not respond to email, etc. The Profs in my post-bacc program are excellent and know to write these dang things immediately or at least soon enough.

How do other people work with 'slow' letter writers? My sense is that he does really like me and my work but that because of his position EVERYONE is always mobbing him for a letter and he is just burned out by annoying pre-meds ... and a stressful job on top of that. 😉 I think I am just going to suck it up and gently keep following up with him as much as I can, but it burns my buttons that I really spent alot of time there working hard and doing a good job (so everyone said) and what if I have nothing to show for it ... 😱

 

[LoneCoyote]

You are not alone in having this problem unfortunately. One of my O-Chem professors was enthusiastic about writing me a letter and in early October I dropped him off the packet of transcripts, personal statements, and resumes that he requested so that he could write, as he put it, a "good, personal letter." I too thought he had done it long ago until I contacted my letter service a couple of weeks ago and found it is not there. So I emailed him and he has not responded. The experience is showing me that this process of gathering letters can be really tedious and I am glad I am getting on this early.

 

[Saturate_68]

That's really good that you started early. It's such a pain in the a** to have an incomplete app just because your letters aren't in.

 

[Adcadet]

this is what I've done, to some success:

1. Ask for a great LOR well in advance. By this I mean at least 2 months. Note the word "great."

2. Give them the envelopes, stamped and addressed when you get a secondary, with either a post-it note with the name of the school and the date it's due or with a note inside. By due date I mean at least a week earlier than when you plan on having all your other materials in.

3. Remind your letter writers two days in advance of when they should mail their letters that it's almost due by email. I found that if you remind them earlier than that, the procrastinators will just put it off, and those who are "on the ball" will have already sent it in. One day in advance also seems to work well.

4. If the person is having their personal secretary send them in, get to know this person well and just deal with them if your letter writer will let you. These people generally will get your stuff sent within 24 hours.

5. If you can, get your letter writers and/or secretaries to send you an email confirmation when they send a letter.

6. Call the schools repeatedly to make sure that your app has arrived, including your LORs. Then a few weeks after they say your app is complete, call again to verify this. I have kept calling schools until they tell me that it is in the hands of the committee - 'cause then I know everything is in. Jefferson told me once that my app was all complete, but then I called back 3 weeks later only to learn that they didn't have some of my LORs. Not sure if they lost them or if they never got sent. Calling repeatedly will also keep you as up-to-date as possible regarding any interviews you might get. Always nice to find out a few days earlier, and scheduling the date right there over the phone can ensure you get the best date possible.

 

[Arginine]

I have also had difficulty tracking down LOR's from people who were very enthusiastic about my work, but who were very busy and swamped with other LOR requests. I ended up writing rough drafts of the LOR's, setting up an appointment to review the rough draft with the person, letting the person edit the letter on the spot, rewriting the letter with editing changes, setting up an appointment to have the person sign the letter, sending the letter off to the letter-forwarding service at my school. An arduous process, but there did not seem to be any other way to get the letters written and sent in.