How does a "covering letter/committee letter" work?

[Trismegistus4]

It seems to me that one of the advantages to a formal post-bacc is the ability to get a letter of recommendation from the pre-med committee/advisors, since most med schools will accept one such letter as meeting the entire LOR requirement to apply, whereas if you don't have a committee letter you have to go out and get 3 separate ones. In the past, my understanding of how this works is that, as long as you maintain a minimum GPA in the program, this letter is totally taken care of; you don't need to do anything at all. This seems good to me, because then one doesn't have to worry about getting to know adjunct professors one only sees once per week in an evening class of 60+ students. Is this true, though, or is the letter service really just a "consolidation" service, where you still have to get evaluations from several different professors and the committee merely coalesces them all into one letter?

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[dca_55]

It seems to me that one of the advantages to a formal post-bacc is the ability to get a letter of recommendation from the pre-med committee/advisors, since most med schools will accept one such letter as meeting the entire LOR requirement to apply, whereas if you don't have a committee letter you have to go out and get 3 separate ones. In the past, my understanding of how this works is that, as long as you maintain a minimum GPA in the program, this letter is totally taken care of; you don't need to do anything at all. This seems good to me, because then one doesn't have to worry about getting to know adjunct professors one only sees once per week in an evening class of 60+ students. Is this true, though, or is the letter service really just a "consolidation" service, where you still have to get evaluations from several different professors and the committee merely coalesces them all into one letter?

It might be different in postbac programs, but at my undergrad we have to submit 3-5 individual letters of recommendation to the commitee. Then someone on the commitee reads them, interviews you, and reads your personal statement before writing their letter. I believe some med schools also want both the commitee letter and your individual letters, so you should probably still try to get individual letters if possible.

 

[Trismegistus4]

Bumping.

Anyone in or completed a post-bac program that offers a committee letter have any insight?

 

[Febrifuge]

Not a lot, since I'm just getting started too, but my PD encouraged me when I suggested that the ED tech job I will be leaving to attend postbac will be a good place to get some letters. She says that if I get great comments from people here, those can be folded into my committee letter, or if the letters stand alone, they can accompany it.

 

[sidewalkman]

I have never heard of a program that would write your committee letter without you actually getting the letters yourself. I'm not saying such a system doesn't exist, just that I've never heard of this.

My undergrad has a letter-writing service, and I plan on fully using it. In fact, I couldn't imagine applying without using the rec service. It saves a ton of time in drafting envelopes and making sure a prof actually sent out a letter to all the schools you wanted to, and it'd have to be easier for an adcom to keep track of, store, and read the one committee letter than 3 or more letters each with a different style. Not to mention the lack of stress. Anecdotally, the MD applicants at my undergrad had this service, but the PhD applicants did not. The MD applicants had the letters consolidated and ready to go months in advance, while the PhD applicants had to sweat it out until the deadline at each school to see if that one last rec letter would get in.

So the option of a committee letter definately can't hurt you, I say.

 

[Febrifuge]

I have never heard of a program that would write your committee letter without you actually getting the letters yourself. I'm not saying such a system doesn't exist, just that I've never heard of this.

For undergrad, I'm sure you're right, but for postbac, it's fairly common for the faculty of the postbac itself to make extensive comments and create a covering LOR that is a lot more current than anything we might be able to get from our undergrad profs. To gain entry to my postbac in 2004, I needed to write to the instructor who had been my undergrad advisor SIX YEARS previous and ask for a letter. I don't know how helpful letters from him or my other instructors would be, for the 2007 app cycle. 😀

 

[sidewalkman]

for postbac, it's fairly common for the faculty of the postbac itself to make extensive comments and create a covering LOR

Wow, I never realized that the collective faculty of a formal program (versus some random premed administrator) would do this for their students without the student having to explicitly ask for recs. That's obviously a HUGE benefit of those formal programs that do this. Call me a fool, but I never knew programs explicitly did this above and beyond just writing a covering letter made up of recs that students solicited themselves, which is what some of the larger postbac programs do (more like have to do, I suppose). I'm shocked that this benefit isn't laid out more clearly on SDN (it isn't spelled out in the way I just did in the FAQ, for example). See where I or someone else could get confused?

That leads to my question. A program just issuing a covering letter does seem to be the norm. However, exactly how "fairly common" is having standing faculty convene to write a collective, unsolicited LOR for each and every student in a program?

 

[LT2]

Just a note regarding the committee letter/process at my school...

All pre-meds (undergrad, grad, post-bacc) go through the same committee process. We submit a mock application and personal statement to the advisor and she matches us with three faculty/MD's to interview with. these interviewers reply to the advisor with evaluations which are used along with an autobiography to write a comprehensive committee letter. i don't know how many schools do this, i've heard our pre-med advising is excellent.

 

[Febrifuge]

Wow, I never realized that the collective faculty of a formal program (versus some random premed administrator) would do this for their students without the student having to explicitly ask for recs. That's obviously a HUGE benefit of those formal programs that do this.

Honestly, since it's been 8 years since I finished my BA and I have next to no experience with studying the sciences, I'm sure I am far more clueless about these things than you. I guess I didn't realize what a great benefit my program will be giving me! (It also sorta begs the question of why anyone would shell out for a formal postbac without a high degree of confidence that decent LORs would come out of it...)

This is from the Bennington College web site:

Evaluation
Transcripts that include both letter grades and narrative comments are provided for all course work. In addition, the Postbaccalaureate Committee evaluates every student's work after each term and provides a comprehensive letter of reference for students applying to medical and veterinary schools.

The Committee is the program director and faculty, pretty much.