I Am Freaking Out About My Letter Of Evaluation!!!

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Bammy

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Two of my professors (humanities professor and Calculus professor) have both sent in a letter of recommendation for me already. One of my professors, a Physical Chemistry professor, told me he would write me the best letter of recommendation since I made an A in that class. He sent the letter to AAMC without a letterhead and signature despite me telling him many times that the letter needed both and despite Interfolio also listing directions. He also sent in the letter way later than the rest of my professors despite having over 5 months to write it.

I e-mailed him back asking him if he could please send in the letter again with the letterhead and signature this time and he said "Sure! I'll do that soon." (I sent this e-mail to him last week)

Today I sent him a reminder e-mail and he emailed me back saying "I can't do anything about it now, I'm leaving the town for a few weeks and won't have internet connection."

I FEEL LIKE CRYING RIGHT NOW!!!!
 
Bammy said:
Two of my professors (humanities professor and Calculus professor) have both sent in a letter of recommendation for me already. One of my professors, a Physical Chemistry professor, told me he would write me the best letter of recommendation since I made an A in that class. He sent the letter to AAMC without a letterhead and signature despite me telling him many times that the letter needed both and despite Interfolio also listing directions. He also sent in the letter way later than the rest of my professors despite having over 5 months to write it.

I e-mailed him back asking him if he could please send in the letter again with the letterhead and signature this time and he said "Sure! I'll do that soon." (I sent this e-mail to him last week)

Today I sent him a reminder e-mail and he emailed me back saying "I can't do anything about it now, I'm leaving the town for a few weeks and won't have internet connection."

I FEEL LIKE CRYING RIGHT NOW!!!!
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Sometimes, when we have an otherwise strong applicant, we just call the letter writer's office to confirm his appointment. We may also ask to speak to him so that he knows why we called.
 
Yeah I would just leave it and submit the faulty letter as is. Not worth the wait and delaying your app
 
How does one know if a letterhead or signature is included when letters are confidential?
 
gonnif said:
LOR's do not have to be submitted with primary. AMCAS will transmit them throughout the cycle. Most school's require them as part of the secondary application. An LOR should never hold up a primary submission
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Oh I meant app as in everything. Forget about the signature and just transmit it through the letter service. If he changes it in time, great. If not, forget it.
 
gonnif said:
That is not quite correct. You as the applicant give up any rights/demand access to see the letter. The letter writer retains rights to show the letter to who he wants, including the applicant if he/she chooses.
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I think you can ask interfolio to check for letterhead...
 
Thanks to everyone who replied! I applied through AMCAS and TMDSAS (texas application service). Although AMCAS hasn't said anything about the letter yet, TMDSAS sent me a message saying they are rejecting the letter due to it not having a letterhead or a signature on it.
I feel horrible right now.
 
If it makes you feel any better, my second science letter has been evading me since she committed to writing an awesome letter. I have no idea if I can expect a letter from her or not lol (I'm 2 years out of school so if she bails I'm eff'ed, so I have no idea why I laugh at this).

Does anyone know if we can edit who our recommenders are after we submit primaries for verification?
 
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Bammy said:
Thanks to everyone who replied! I applied through AMCAS and TMDSAS (texas application service). Although AMCAS hasn't said anything about the letter yet, TMDSAS sent me a message saying they are rejecting the letter due to it not having a letterhead or a signature on it.
I feel horrible right now.
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Your prof is a goof ball and I am sorry he did this.
If you are a TX resident, your best chances are in TX.
Will you be able to augment your list?
 
gyngyn said:
Your prof is a goof ball and I am sorry he did this.
If you are a TX resident, your best chances are in TX.
Will you be able to augment your list?
Click to expand...

The Texas application service is the one that sent me the e-mail saying that they were rejecting the letter. I would like to get into a Texas school.
 
rachiie01 said:
If it makes you feel any better, my second science letter has been evading me since she committed to writing an awesome letter. I have no idea if I can expect a letter from her or not lol (I'm 2 years out of school so if she bails I'm eff'ed, so I have no idea why I laugh at this).

Does anyone know if we can edit who our recommenders are after we submit primaries for verification?
Click to expand...

Damn, I'm sorry. If I were you, I would e-mail her or visit her and remind her.
And I would like to know the answer to your second question as well.
 
I have emailed haha I said "evading" because I'm pretty sure she's overwhelmed with a spring term right now and hasn't gotten around to it= purposely avoiding me lol.

LoRs suck because it's the part of your application that you don't have control over. Try to keep calm when things go wrong, because I have a feeling this process will only get more and more stressful. Maybe you can call him or email him and catch him before he leaves and get him to resubmit.
 
gyngyn said:
Do you have enough good letters without P Chem goof ball?
If you are in school in TX, goof ball should be aware of the implications of this oversight.
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I'm not sure if the other letters are great or not since I haven't read them but I do know the other two professors fairly well and I asked them to please write a strong letter of recommendation.

His letter is the one I was looking most forward to because he said "Anyone who makes an A in this tough course will receive the best letter of recommendation from me."
He is the only science professor I have for a letter. The other professors teach humanities and calculus.

I am thinking about emailing him again tomorrow (he hasn't responded to the e-mail I sent yesterday asking if there was anything he could do) and asking him if he could please upload the letter again with a letterhead and a signature after he comes back ( he said he would be gone 2 or 3 weeks). He is a jerk so I am nervous he will probably say no. 🙁
 
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Bammy said:
I am thinking about emailing him again tomorrow (he hasn't responded to the e-mail I sent yesterday asking if there was anything he could do) and asking him if he could please upload the letter again with a letterhead and a signature after he comes back ( he said he would be gone 2 or 3 weeks). He is a jerk so I am nervous he will probably say no. 🙁
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Tell him his letter was thrown out because of the protocol deviations.
He won't want his beautiful letter to go unread.
 
gyngyn said:
Tell him his letter was thrown out because of the protocol deviations.
He won't want his beautiful letter to go unread.
Click to expand...

Lol. I did tell him they rejected his letter. He told me he would upload one with the letterhead and signature but he forgot despite me reminding him with an e-mail. Interfolio also sent him an e-mail.

Thanks for giving me advice gyngyn. I really hope he can come back after a few weeks and resend the letter.
 
rachiie01 said:
I have emailed haha I said "evading" because I'm pretty sure she's overwhelmed with a spring term right now and hasn't gotten around to it= purposely avoiding me lol.

LoRs suck because it's the part of your application that you don't have control over. Try to keep calm when things go wrong, because I have a feeling this process will only get more and more stressful. Maybe you can call him or email him and catch him before he leaves and get him to resubmit.
Click to expand...

Yea. This is a nightmare. I alerted all of my letter writers 5 months in advance with periodic e-mails and office visits reminding them. I can't believe this STILL happened to me 🙁

I'm sure your professor will eventually come to it after finals are over.
 
Bammy said:
Lol. I did tell him they rejected his letter. He told me he would upload one with the letterhead and signature but he forgot despite me reminding him with an e-mail. Interfolio also sent him an e-mail.

Thanks for giving me advice gyngyn. I really hope he can come back after a few weeks and resend the letter.
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If he has an administrative assistant, enlist their aid.
They can print it and put it on the dope's desk for signature.
 
gyngyn said:
If he has an administrative assistant, enlist their aid.
They can print it and put it on the dope's desk for signature.
Click to expand...

Hmm, that is a great idea! However, I don't believe he has an aid. I will try to find out right now.
Thanks!
 
Also where is this clown going that is completely without internet in 2015?!

On a more helpful note, if you email him again, the worst he can do is ignore you or say no, but even then you're still in the same position you are now. Email him again or try to catch him before he leaves (did he give you his exact departure date?) to impress upon him the gravity of his carelessness.

And I second what gyngyn said, I am sorry this happened to you.
 
rachiie01 said:
Also where is this clown going that is completely without internet in 2015?!

On a more helpful note, if you email him again, the worst he can do is ignore you or say no, but even then you're still in the same position you are now. Email him again or try to catch him before he leaves (did he give you his exact departure date?) to impress upon him the gravity of his carelessness.

And I second what gyngyn said, I am sorry this happened to you.
Click to expand...

I have a feeling he doesn't want to go through the hassle of adding an official letterhead and a signature and then scanning it and uploading it.
From his e-mail, it sounded like he had already left town. Also, he checks his email every 15 minutes. He bragged about this in class and how he can't stand it when people don't check their e-mails throughout the day.

I am certain he read the e-mail I sent him last night telling him how important this letter is to me and if there was anything that he could do. He hasn't replied. I am going to e-mail him again tomorrow.
 
@Bammy I looked into this further (still having trouble with my own LoR) and it appears that you CAN add LoR entries to your application after you submit for verification. Although you cannot delete entries once you submit, you can update your entry to note that the letter will no longer be sent. This is for AMCAS, so I'm not sure about TMDSAS, but they may operate the same.

Worst case scenario (assuming AMCAS and TMDSAS operate the same way), you should be able to add another letter and note that his won't be coming anymore, thus your application won't be affected.
 
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