LOR issue, please help!

[CalDent]

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Hi,

So one of my professors finally wrote my letter and submitted it to the letter service online, but he spelled my last name wrong!!! Only one of the letters in the name is off, but still WTFF!

Now he has gone on vacation for a month, and probably won't respond to my emails for a while.

What should I do? Should I wait for him to come back and have him submit a new draft? Or should I just go ahead and submit as it is, and hope that dental schools won't care too much?

Any advice would be appreciated!

Thanks

 

[nze82]

Hi,

So one of my professors finally wrote my letter and submitted it to the letter service online, but he spelled my last name wrong!!! Only one of the letters in the name is off, but still WTFF!

Now he has gone on vacation for a month, and probably won't respond to my emails for a while.

What should I do? Should I wait for him to come back and have him submit a new draft? Or should I just go ahead and submit as it is, and hope that dental schools won't care too much?

Any advice would be appreciated!

Thanks

Send an email to your designated schools and explain the situation. They will most likely make a copy of that email and include it with the copy of the letter, so that anyone who looks at your file knows what's going on. It's not that big of a deal. Obviously, only one letter is off, they'd know it's a typo and that's very understandable. We don't live in a perfect world, and I'm sure typos happen a lot specially during a process that involves this much paper work!

 

[nartnad]

Send an email to your designated schools and explain the situation. They will most likely make a copy of that email and include it with the copy of the letter, so that anyone who looks at your file knows what's going on. It's not that big of a deal. Obviously, only one letter is off, they'd know it's a typo and that's very understandable. We don't live in a perfect world, and I'm sure typos happen a lot specially during a process that involves this much paper work!

I dunno if I would do that. Cuz first of all, how do you know he spelled it wrong? Shouldnt it be confidential? Writing to tell the schools about a typo would indicate that you looked at it. Id leave it alone, its just a typo, and you didnt type it.

 

[CalDent]

Thanks, yea I guess there's not much else I can do about it since he's on vacay. I just find this whole letter business so pointless ahhh..

 

[nze82]

I dunno if I would do that. Cuz first of all, how do you know he spelled it wrong? Shouldnt it be confidential? Writing to tell the schools about a typo would indicate that you looked at it. Id leave it alone, its just a typo, and you didnt type it.

That's a good point.
My thought was that perhaps the professor who wrote the letter told him/her that he/she has misspelled the name!
But yea, if that's not the case, you don't want to mention anything to the school about it, because that means you've read the letter, which means the letter is no longer confidential.

 

[CalDent]

I dunno if I would do that. Cuz first of all, how do you know he spelled it wrong? Shouldnt it be confidential? Writing to tell the schools about a typo would indicate that you looked at it. Id leave it alone, its just a typo, and you didnt type it.

Hmm, that's a good point. I only knew about it because the letters show up on our letter service account, and the career center folks posted a note saying that the name was spelled wrong.

It's a minor issue (eg. spelled "Raynel" instead of "Raynal"), and I don't think schools will hold that of all things against me, will they? Lol

 

[nze82]

Thanks, yea I guess there's not much else I can do about it since he's on vacay. I just find this whole letter business so pointless ahhh..

Seriously though, a typo in your letter isn't going to affect you much. After all, it's not your fault!
I know people who have had typos in their personal statements (minor ones, like the one in your letter) and they still got in. Do you think people who are reviewing a large volume of applications are going to actually scrutinize your application for typos? I think NOT!
Now, if you have some major grammatical problems, indicating that you're incapable of writing in English, it's going to be a whole different ballgame and that will most likely hurt you!
Other than that, just relax!