is it possible for adcoms to tell you if your LOR were bad/negative?

[havil]

im just going to be straight up and let everything out of my mind

i wrote LOR for all my writers and had them read through it and submit it in front of me. However for my biochem prof (who btw was very supportive of the idea of having me write a LOR for him), he said that he did not like the way i wrote the LOR. He said that i focused too much on generic traits (the AAMC competancies) and he wanted to focus more on how the content of biochem itself would make me a good physican. we actually had quite a back and forth about which style was best but he was pretty firm on his stance and to give you the tldr; he told me that its basically his way or the highway. He also said that he wanted to read it on his own time and make his own adjustments independently.

he also said other things in the meeting that i think are worth pointing out
1. he said that he was very tight on time (i told him i want it to be submitted on the may the 20th)
2. he told me because he was so tight on time that he will end up using most the content that i have pre written for him anyways
3. he said that after he's done writing his draft that he will send it back to me to read it over

anyways, fast forward a couple of days later (on may 17th ish), i get an email notification from interfolio saying that he has submitted the letter. i contacted him to ask if he was still interested in having me read over the letter but he said that i should just submit it.

i am a very paranoid person, and often this leads me to worry about stupid outlandish things.
I worry that because of our back and forths, the fact that the process was a hassle ((especially since he was tight on time), and his 180-shift stance on having me read over his LOR, I worry that maybe he wrote a very negative letter?? i know the probability of him doing that is very very slim but idk man i am paranoid like that

so to get to my question, i am wondering , will adcoms let me know if a letter was negative/really bad if i ask?



*

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Nontrad_FL_LGBT]

The letter wasn't that bad. You're being neurotic dude.

 

[Moko]

im just going to be straight up and let everything out of my mind

i wrote LOR for all my writers and had them read through it and submit it in front of me. However for my biochem prof (who btw was very supportive of the idea of having me write a LOR for him), he said that he did not like the way i wrote the LOR. He said that i focused too much on generic traits (the AAMC competancies) and he wanted to focus more on how the content of biochem itself would make me a good physican. we actually had quite a back and forth about which style was best but he was pretty firm on his stance and to give you the tldr; he told me that its basically his way or the highway. He also said that he wanted to read it on hsi own time and make his own adjustments independently.

he also said other things in the meeting that i think are worth pointing out
1. he said that he was very tight on time (i told him i want it to be submitted on the may the 20th)
2. he told me because he was so tight on time that he will end up using most the content that i have pre written for him anyways
3. he said that after he's done writing his draft that he will send it back to me to read it over

anyways, fast forward a couple of days later (on may 17th ish), i get an email notification from interfolio saying that he has submitted the letter. i contacted him to ask if he was still interested in having me read over the letter but he said that i should just submit it.

i am a very paranoid person, and often this leads me to worry about stupid outlandish things.
I worry that because of our back and forths, the fact that the process was a hassle ((especially since he was tight on time), and his 180-shift stance on having me read over his LOR, I worry that maybe he wrote a very negative letter?? i know the probability of him doing that is very very slim but idk man i am paranoid like that

so to get to my question, i am wondering , will adcoms let me know if a letter was negative/really bad if i ask?

Honestly, if one of my students was this pushy and insisted on micromanaging everything including watching me submit their LOR in front of them, I would also tell them to either let me do my thing or ask another person for the letter. Even if I was intending to write a student a glowing letter (which I always do), an interaction like the one you described would significantly dull my enthusiasm.

As someone on an adcom, I would never disclose that a letter was negative or lukewarm. It's not my place and a betrayal of the letter writer's trust that what they wrote would remain in confidence. Hopefully you will use this as a learning opportunity to avoid similarly poor interactions in the future. Just my thoughts.

 

[havil]

Honestly, if one of my students was this pushy and insisted on micromanaging everything including watching me submit their LOR in front of them, I would also tell them to either let me do my thing or ask another person for the letter.

trust me i was very uprfornt with my intentions,

i told the professor in person during office hours how i plan on having this operation play out and he was very supportive of it. he liked the idea of me basically doing all the work because he was busy.

>As someone on an adcom, I would never disclose that a letter was negative or lukewarm. It's not my place and a betrayal of the letter writer's trust that what they wrote would remain in confidence. Hopefully you will use this as a learning opportunity to avoid similarly poor interactions in the future. Just my thoughts.

if i do end up getting rejected, how would i know if its due to this letter (if he ended up writing me a troll letter/negative letter)? Like shouldnt adcoms let me know where things went south so that i can improve?

 

[havil]

The letter wasn't that bad.

?
How do u know

 

[sarcasmrules]

?
How do u know

Because unless the professor has some personal vendetta against you or you did something to really piss them off, the worst their letter will be is mediocre but not detrimental.

 

[havil]

Because unless the professor has some personal vendetta against you or you did something to really piss them off, the worst their letter will be is mediocre but not detrimental.

whats really throwing me off edge is that they didnt allow me to see what they wrote despite telling me in the meeting that they would do that. idk why the sudden shift in prespective. thats whats making me think that there is something sinister that he doesnt want me to see

 

[sarcasmrules]

whats really throwing me off edge is that they didnt allow me to see what they wrote despite telling me in the meeting that they would do that. idk why the sudden shift in prespective. thats whats making me think that there is something sinister that he doesnt want me to see

That's the standard practice for LORs......

 

[eigen]

i wrote LOR for all my writers and had them read through it and submit it in front of me.

I'm just going to highlight this part here. While this may be common some places, this throws up a huge red flag to me. It's not currently part of AMCAS or AACOMAS, but many LOR platforms require the submitter to certify that they are the sole author of the letter they are submitting.

AACOMAS does have this particular section:

Evaluations (sometimes called Letters of Evaluation, Letters of Reference, or Letters of Recommendation) are submitted by the evaluators themselves; they cannot be completed or submitted by the applicant or another party on behalf of the evaluator.

That your approach, to me, skirts very close to the edge of this intent with letters.

we actually had quite a back and forth about which style was best but he was pretty firm on his stance and to give you the tldr; he told me that its basically his way or the highway. He also said that he wanted to read it on his own time and make his own adjustments independently.

Moving on, while there are broad discussions of the ethics of ghostwritten letters (personally, I think it's wrong to ask students to do it), your narrative suggests that you effectively pressured your writer into using the letter you wrote / wanted rather than what they felt comfortable writing. The fact that you felt like you should have been able to review a letter to ensure you were OK with the content is also not OK.

so to get to my question, i am wondering , will adcoms let me know if a letter was negative/really bad if i ask?

As a letter writer, I would consider this a violation of confidentiality. For what it's worth, here's what AAMC says in their guide to maintaining the confidentiality of letters (https://students-residents.aamc.org/media/7851/download). AAMC has a way for letter writers to report violations of confidentiality by schools, and from what I understand they take it seriously.

Rationale: To ensure that all information in an applicant’s file remains confidential, admissions officers need to remind their staff, interviewers and admissions committee members about the need to maintain confidentiality throughout the application process. The release of confidential information in an evaluation letter to an applicant, no matter how inadvertent, can negatively impact the applicant’s relationship with both the letter writer and the medical school to which he/she is applying and undermine the candor with which letter writers are likely to convey information in the future.

Overall, there are a lot of concerning parts of your post as they relate to ethics, and that is not a good thing in medical applicants.

 

[Hollow Knight]

You said it yourself dude, you’re being paranoid. Relax. It’s fine. Most letters are generic anyway. It sounds like this professor really cared about you.

Just so you know, a “bad letter” reads like “This person was an awful human being who never worked or showed up on time and I wouldn’t want them as my doctor.”

 

[Nontrad_FL_LGBT]

I understand that you're nervous and really want to get into med school, but a mid LOR isn't going to make or break you, if it even is mid. You've made like 10 posts in the past week about incredibly minor things you're ruminating on. Submit your stuff and go on vacation and completely forget about the app process, chill out.

 

[Goro]

im just going to be straight up and let everything out of my mind

i wrote LOR for all my writers and had them read through it and submit it in front of me. However for my biochem prof (who btw was very supportive of the idea of having me write a LOR for him), he said that he did not like the way i wrote the LOR. He said that i focused too much on generic traits (the AAMC competancies) and he wanted to focus more on how the content of biochem itself would make me a good physican. we actually had quite a back and forth about which style was best but he was pretty firm on his stance and to give you the tldr; he told me that its basically his way or the highway. He also said that he wanted to read it on his own time and make his own adjustments independently.

he also said other things in the meeting that i think are worth pointing out
1. he said that he was very tight on time (i told him i want it to be submitted on the may the 20th)
2. he told me because he was so tight on time that he will end up using most the content that i have pre written for him anyways
3. he said that after he's done writing his draft that he will send it back to me to read it over

anyways, fast forward a couple of days later (on may 17th ish), i get an email notification from interfolio saying that he has submitted the letter. i contacted him to ask if he was still interested in having me read over the letter but he said that i should just submit it.

i am a very paranoid person, and often this leads me to worry about stupid outlandish things.
I worry that because of our back and forths, the fact that the process was a hassle ((especially since he was tight on time), and his 180-shift stance on having me read over his LOR, I worry that maybe he wrote a very negative letter?? i know the probability of him doing that is very very slim but idk man i am paranoid like that

so to get to my question, i am wondering , will adcoms let me know if a letter was negative/really bad if i ask?



*

Nope.
EDIT: If I had a student demand that I read and submit a letter in front of them, I'd kick them out of my office. Then I'd write a negative LOR.
I'd also never, ever have a student write a LOR themselves.

 

[chssoccer7]

im just going to be straight up and let everything out of my mind

i wrote LOR for all my writers and had them read through it and submit it in front of me. However for my biochem prof (who btw was very supportive of the idea of having me write a LOR for him), he said that he did not like the way i wrote the LOR. He said that i focused too much on generic traits (the AAMC competancies) and he wanted to focus more on how the content of biochem itself would make me a good physican. we actually had quite a back and forth about which style was best but he was pretty firm on his stance and to give you the tldr; he told me that its basically his way or the highway. He also said that he wanted to read it on his own time and make his own adjustments independently.

he also said other things in the meeting that i think are worth pointing out
1. he said that he was very tight on time (i told him i want it to be submitted on the may the 20th)
2. he told me because he was so tight on time that he will end up using most the content that i have pre written for him anyways
3. he said that after he's done writing his draft that he will send it back to me to read it over

anyways, fast forward a couple of days later (on may 17th ish), i get an email notification from interfolio saying that he has submitted the letter. i contacted him to ask if he was still interested in having me read over the letter but he said that i should just submit it.

i am a very paranoid person, and often this leads me to worry about stupid outlandish things.
I worry that because of our back and forths, the fact that the process was a hassle ((especially since he was tight on time), and his 180-shift stance on having me read over his LOR, I worry that maybe he wrote a very negative letter?? i know the probability of him doing that is very very slim but idk man i am paranoid like that

so to get to my question, i am wondering , will adcoms let me know if a letter was negative/really bad if i ask?



*

You're being just neurotic enough to cause your writers to actually write bad things. Chill out.

 

[pablo213]

im just going to be straight up and let everything out of my mind

i wrote LOR for all my writers and had them read through it and submit it in front of me. However for my biochem prof (who btw was very supportive of the idea of having me write a LOR for him), he said that he did not like the way i wrote the LOR. He said that i focused too much on generic traits (the AAMC competancies) and he wanted to focus more on how the content of biochem itself would make me a good physican. we actually had quite a back and forth about which style was best but he was pretty firm on his stance and to give you the tldr; he told me that its basically his way or the highway. He also said that he wanted to read it on his own time and make his own adjustments independently.

he also said other things in the meeting that i think are worth pointing out
1. he said that he was very tight on time (i told him i want it to be submitted on the may the 20th)
2. he told me because he was so tight on time that he will end up using most the content that i have pre written for him anyways
3. he said that after he's done writing his draft that he will send it back to me to read it over

anyways, fast forward a couple of days later (on may 17th ish), i get an email notification from interfolio saying that he has submitted the letter. i contacted him to ask if he was still interested in having me read over the letter but he said that i should just submit it.

i am a very paranoid person, and often this leads me to worry about stupid outlandish things.
I worry that because of our back and forths, the fact that the process was a hassle ((especially since he was tight on time), and his 180-shift stance on having me read over his LOR, I worry that maybe he wrote a very negative letter?? i know the probability of him doing that is very very slim but idk man i am paranoid like that

so to get to my question, i am wondering , will adcoms let me know if a letter was negative/really bad if i ask?



*

Your anxiety and theory crafting reminds me a bit of myself haha. I agree with the others that pressuring your LOR writers wasn't the correct move and that you shouldn't become accustomed to writing your own LORs and being privvy to their contents. As others mentioned, standard practice is to be blind to them. That being said, I would follow your gut to not use that letter. Unless you don't have anyone else to reach out to, it's too risky.

As for the bolded, probably unlikely they'll let you know unless it's so bad or good they bring it up at an interview. Some schools have post interview or app feedback which could be another avenue.

 

[Zirah]

Applicants aren't supposed to know what their LORs say, hence all the confidentiality measures. It's unusual to get to know so much about any of them, let alone feel entitled to. Also, if you don't trust even one person to write you a genuine and supportive letter then you might not have wanted to ask them, and reflect on why that might be.

 

[Goro]

Yo.

As for the bolded, probably unlikely they'll let you know unless it's so bad or good they bring it up at an interview. Some schools have post interview or app feedback which could be another avenue.

Interviewers are trained NOT to let people know if their LORs are bad. That would definitely lead to legal issues!

 

[cj_cregg]

The vast majority of applicants do not have the opportunity to read their letters of recommendation. I agree with others above that it's concerning that you apparently not only wrote most of your letters, but insisted on doing so. If this person did decide to write you a bad letter based on your behavior on this, it's out of your control at this point and nothing worth stressing over beyond changing your behavior in the future.

It would be inappropriate for you to ask about the quality of your letters to an adcom member, interviewer, app reviewer, etc. They may choose to make some generic comments about the strength of various parts of your application including letters. But for them to share, and especially for you to request, any specific details about a letter from a particular writer would be a huge red flag. Once you are rejected, some schools may provide application feedback at which point they may advise you to seek out additional letters if appropriate. That said, it sounds like you would not be asking this person to write you a letter again anyway for another application cycle if you had one.

In summary - leave it alone, move on, and start focusing on how you can prepare for interviews.

EDIT: fixed typos from my chunky fingers on my phone