LOR dilemma

[honeybee87]

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So UC Davis School of medicine recommends a physician or a clinician letter of recommendation. Unfortunately I do not have this type of letter of recommendation. However I do you have a letter from my volunteer coordinator. But this letter is weak, essentially the contents of the letter is as following:

This student has volunteered in the X, Y, and Z department.
They have a cumulated X amount of hours.
Their duties include X,Y, and Z.
They show up on time. We are glad to have them

Clearly they go into a little bit more detail but those are the main ideas of each paragraph. Essentially they send a very generic Letter of recommendation that is not specific to me at all. To be honest I’m not even sure if they put at the top we recommend student ask for admission and medical school, though I would hope that they did that. Does this letter fulfill UCD recommendation? Even if it does for fill their recommendation should I send this letter.
@gonnif @gyngyn @Moko @LizzyM

If it makes a difference, it is just “recommended” and not “highly recommended” as some schools use that terminology. Will this aspect of my app affect me greatly? Every other aspect is good

 

[LizzyM]

I'd say that it is unfortunate that you were not aware a year ago that you would need a physician or clinician letter in order to apply to UC Davis. I would not consider a volunteer coordinator letter to fit the bill but you could always call the school on Monday and ask if it would.

 

[honeybee87]

I'd say that it is unfortunate that you were not aware a year ago that you would need a physician or clinician letter in order to apply to UC Davis. I would not consider a volunteer coordinator letter to fit the bill but you could always call the school on Monday and ask if it would.

Would it have a major impact on my application? I could always ask the physician I shadowed for a LOR, I’m pretty cool with him. Would you recommend that?

When asking for the letter, would it be weird if I said something like “I know your busy, I can send a draft if you would like”. He’s a family friend so again I think we have a good relationship

 

[honeybee87]

For schools like this that recommend a clinician LOR, is shadowing good in this case?

 

[LizzyM]

Family friends are not a good choice because they are not considered objective.

 

[honeybee87]

Family friends are not a good choice because they are not considered objective.

Ok, I’ll ask another doc I shadowed who I’ve also developed a good relationship with. But in this case, are LOR from physicians we shadowed OK or beneficial? If so, what are adcom members looking in this letter?

 

[Engrailed]

Ok, I’ll ask another doc I shadowed who I’ve also developed a good relationship with. But in this case, are LOR from physicians we shadowed OK or beneficial? If so, what are adcom members looking in this letter?

I will be getting a LOR from a dr Ive shadowed for a few days but knownna few yrs due to overlapping dept in research where we first crossed paths. Also curious @LizzyM

 

[LizzyM]

I'm not from UC Davis so I have no idea what they are looking for in this letter.

 

[honeybee87]

Any other thoughts?