LOR from grad student

[blossompp3]

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I was just wondering if med schools would look down on this, b/c I was planning on doing that for one of my letters. He was the only teacher of an upper division course and I think he would right a strong letter, but would it hurt that he's in grad school and not faculty? Thanks for any advice!

 

[Friday]

You mean he was the actual instructor and not the TA? I mean, if he's the TA, get him to write an LOR that the instructor will then sign off on or use as the basis of their LOR.

If he's the instructor, you may want to see if he can write an LOR that the head of the dept can sign or something.

On the other hand, if he clearly indicates that he's was the sole instructor of the course, the adcoms should look at if different from if he was just a TA.

 

[blossompp3]

Yeah, he was the actual instructor, which I thought was weird but I guess the department thought he was qualified. Does that make it okay to use a letter from him? 😕

 

[uclabruin2003]

does he have a phD? that may matter more....just a thought.

 

[dnelsen]

I am applying to the U of MN and they actually encourage you to have a TA write the letter if the individual knows you well. I think most schools would rather have a letter written by someone who knows you really well and can speak to your strengths (or weaknesses) than from someone with a specific title or degree.

 

[DoctorMalki]

one of the schools I applied to put me on post secondary hold. They want more letters from me, I have already submitted 3 faculty and 1 EC letter. They want additional information and letters. It is hard to get more faculty letters for me, will a TA letter be good enough? I doubt the professor will sign it because I didn't know him very well.

 

[aparecida]

My premed advisor told me that as long as my other two letters were from full professors, it'd be fine to have one of them be from a grad student instructor.