Letters of Recommendation

[Clemson Doc]

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Hi guys, I just found this forum. Good stuff indeed. 🙂

I have a question about my letters of recommendation. I have just submitted AMCAS (I know, I'm bordering on late, but I had to take the August MCAT and couldn't work on AMCAS until after that). I have applied to 15 schools (11 M.D., 4 D.O.), and have received secondaries from three M.D. schools (Medical University of South Carolina, George Washington, and Ohio State) despite the fact that I only submitted AMCAS a week ago.

I am lining up my recommendation letters, and hoped to do like some of you and have my letters sent to each school before they are requested. That way, I can have my recommenders write the letters at once and streamline the process somewhat. The only problem is that I don't yet have the necessary forms from each school that must be included with each letter.

How do I access each school's secondary application form before they request one from me? Those of you who sent your recommendation letters ahead of time had to get these forms somehow. Any advice is appreciated. If it helps, here are the schools to which I have applied:

Medical University of South Carolina
University of South Carolina
Emory University
Wake Forest University
Virginia Commonwealth University
George Washington University
Georgetown University
University of Maryland
Johns Hopkins University
Tulane University
Ohio State University

Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine
New York College of Osteopathic Medicine
Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine
Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine

Thanks in advance!

 

[MDmiracle]

I can tell you this, most schools do not require a special form though some do. If your really that keen on sending them out now I would call the schools and ask them. Also do a search for the secondary links it should be on here somewhere. Last, NYCOM doesn't send secondaries. You fill out the "secondary" at your interview, if you get one.
Good Luck.

 

[Amy B]

Does your undergrad program have a pre-med advisor that will handle all your letters? That is the very best thing to do. My school gives a standard form that has a signed waiver part, rate the applicant questions and a part for an essay. Then the school gets the recommenders to send the form straight to them and they send them to all the schools you request them to send them to.

How are you going to handle the letters? Are you having the writers send them directly to the schools? Do you really want them to fill out a new form for each and every school you apply to. Some of them are really long if you use the schools form.

Anyway Virginia DO school's is on the opening page of their web site. I did my before and had it ready to send when I got the request. It is long.

Chicago sends you a paper form after screening

PCOM is also paper with one essay.

Oh and VCU requires you use your pre-med department and or advisor/committee. If youy have one and don't use it, you better have a darn good reason. Their secondary is on line after you pass their screening process.

Good luck

 

[Clemson Doc]

Thanks for the replies so far.

My school does have a committee that will write a letter, but to be honest I don't like the way they do it. You choose eight or more faculty, the chief health professions advisor asks each one about you (probably over the phone), and then a letter is composed based on their responses.

My application will be a lot stronger with individual letters, but I am somewhat concerned about schools that say they require you to use a committee if you have one. Finding eight faculty members to use as my "committee" would be tough, as I have been out of school for over a year. In addtion, waiting on the committee (who is probably very swamped right now with requests) to write my letter is an issue. I would hate for them to delay my secondaries by weeks or even months.

So the main issue is: how strict are schools about using a committee if you have one available? The health professions advisor at my school said that it doesn't matter - I could use a committee letter or ask several professors to write a letter for me and have them send the letters directly to each school. However, this was my first contact with him so I don't know how knowledgeable he really is on this topic.

 

[SMW]

Call those schools and ask. It would be far worse to have your application rejected for not following instructions (I just assumed they meant what they said when they said you had to use your school's committee if one existed) than to have it be late. If you opt for individual letters, use a letter service. Then your profs don't have to send out dozens of letters, and you can waive your right to see the letters, as med schools prefer.

 

[Amy B]

VCU will 100% want to know why you did not use the committee. If I were you, I would call or email them and explain the situation and ask what they would suggest.

Why don't you get the commitee letter, but in addition to that, also get individual letters that can be sent straight to the schools?