Non Soliciated LOR

[drusier]

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Quick Question,
I called a dental school asking if they had recieved my committee LOR and they had not. However they did say they received a letter from Dr. X on my behalf. I am confident this letter is not positive/neutral. I never asked for this letter to be sent. The letter was received within the past week. Questions:
DO you think the board has read the letter
Do I have a right to have the school fax me a copy
Do I have the right to ask the board not to read the letter
Most likely I will exlain the situation regarding this person on Monday as I shadowed him professionally, I became his tenant, he sexually harassed my girlfriend (signed and notorized affidavid by her), he took me to small claims court over rent(a gentlemens agreement to xchange services lawn mowing car detailing for rent), we went to mediation and settled. My thoughts are even if I asked them not to read it, they still would and so I would like to explain things (with documentation if necessary). I know the committee letter will be veryyyy positive. I thought things were though between the two of us...guess not. What should I do?

 

[luder98]

Wow, doesn't sound very good. Sorry to hear your story. Most likely they will read the letter. In general, negative feedback is more "effective" than positive one. Good luck, man.

 

[groundhog]

Quick Question,
I called a dental school asking if they had recieved my committee LOR and they had not. However they did say they received a letter from Dr. X on my behalf. I am confident this letter is not positive/neutral. I never asked for this letter to be sent. The letter was received within the past week. Questions:
DO you think the board has read the letter
Do I have a right to have the school fax me a copy
Do I have the right to ask the board not to read the letter
Most likely I will exlain the situation regarding this person on Monday as I shadowed him professionally, I became his tenant, he sexually harassed my girlfriend (signed and notorized affidavid by her), he took me to small claims court over rent(a gentlemens agreement to xchange services lawn mowing car detailing for rent), we went to mediation and settled. My thoughts are even if I asked them not to read it, they still would and so I would like to explain things (with documentation if necessary). I know the committee letter will be veryyyy positive. I thought things were though between the two of us...guess not. What should I do?

Wow, I'm no attorney, but Dr. X may have just shot himself in the foot. Unsolicited, and if negative, the LOR may be down right slander. I would talk to an attorney whom you trust ASAP .

 

[drusier]

i understand the legal ramifications however Im not a spiteful person like he is...i just wanna get in d-school.

 

[Dr.Smiley-OR]

Sorry to hear your story man, Good luck!
I have a question though. How did AADSAS or the dental schools you applied receive Dr.X letter when you did not request it to be sent. Are you saying that Dr.X send it himself? How did he know your personal information (social security, address, what school you apply to, etc......) to be able to sent his letter? If he did so, without your knowledge, he is up for a law suit. And I agree with other post that you should consult an attorney ASAP. Your application is not screwed this year but also years to come (if you do not get accepted this year and decide to apply again).

 

[aphistis]

Agree with everyone else so far; you may not be a vengeful person, but get a copy of that letter and if there's *anything* critical in there that he can't substantiate, it's time to break out the wooden cross & nails. If he's willing to go to this length to sabotage you, punitive legal action is perhaps the only effective remedy you have left.

 

[drusier]

Thanks for the advice guys....a week or two before my interview i called his secretary and asked if he would be willing to sign documentation of my time shadowing that is how. Monday I will find out if anyother schools have this letter. My plan as of now:
Call monday morning; inform the secretary that the letter was unsoliciated and ask if she would be willing to mail me the origional (atleast a copy). I have heard that it is MY file and I have to approve everything in it. Assuming the letter is negative or I dont know what was said (ie it is not mailed/faxed back) then I will talk to the dean and explain the situation fully and ask her to disregard the letter. The problem is it is from an alumni and dentist. I feel this is better than not saying anything. What are the odds the board would review my file one week after my interview because they received just one letter (i would think they would wait). My committee letter will be overnighted most likely. I would imagine that I would have to prove losses associated with any court case. This would require the school writing a letter saying they would have let me in but....this wont happen.

 

[boogaking]

Just curious... why would this Dr. X go out of his way to discredit your being... what happened... what did you do... there's got to be a explanation for the nation of SDNers .... we need the whole scoop... there's always two sides to everything... and it's only fair to find out what happened 🙂 ok ok i guess im being a little nosey but then again... just curious...

besides... this is weird... it's a pain in the ass to try and get LOR's in the first place... then you telling us that this Dr. X went out of his way to write a letter ..sent it to all the schools you're applying to... without you even knowing... hmmm... are you just being paranoid? 😕

 

[justletmein]

woah dude! You wanna borrow my sword? Just kiddin... hey there's something I don't understand.. you dont like this guy but he wrote you a letter? Am i missing something? Did you ask him to write a letter before things went sour or something? Sorry maybe i overlooked something? Goodluck anyhow Drusier!

 

[Dr.Smiley-OR]

Thanks for the advice guys....a week or two before my interview i called his secretary and asked if he would be willing to sign documentation of my time shadowing that is how. Monday I will find out if anyother schools have this letter. My plan as of now:
Call monday morning; inform the secretary that the letter was unsoliciated and ask if she would be willing to mail me the origional (atleast a copy). I have heard that it is MY file and I have to approve everything in it. Assuming the letter is negative or I dont know what was said (ie it is not mailed/faxed back) then I will talk to the dean and explain the situation fully and ask her to disregard the letter. The problem is it is from an alumni and dentist. I feel this is better than not saying anything. What are the odds the board would review my file one week after my interview because they received just one letter (i would think they would wait). My committee letter will be overnighted most likely. I would imagine that I would have to prove losses associated with any court case. This would require the school writing a letter saying they would have let me in but....this wont happen.

Hey, I am not trying to accuse you of anything here, but there is something very confused that I would like to ask you, if you don't mind answer.

1) Did you get an interview invitation?
2) If so, can you actually get an interview invitation if your profile is incomplete? (you told us that your letter from the committee is not there yet, am I right?. I think so far the only school that invite students to interview without a complete profile is BU. So unless you are talking about BU, this is a little bit unclear for me).
3)Did the dentist send his letter to AADSAS or to this particular school only? If to only one school, then how could he know about this school as one of your choices?

Like the above post said, there are a lot of detail that you have left out. Since this is a very interesting case, but most of us here are very nosy, please explain furthermore. Otherwise, it is hard to really give you a good advice.
Once again, I am not accusing you of anything, ok? Like many others, we all have so many questions.

Good luck!

 

[Mo007]

I am sorry to hear the OP's situation with this particular LOR... What kind of message does Dr. X want to send to the schools about you?

Before we all speculate, or make something out of all this... I would agree with others recommending the OP to get to the bottom of this, by getting a copy of the letter, this might work for you as much as we all thinking it might work against you.

Like someone else suggested, the OP can share some past experience with this Dr. X. I believe that could play a role on why he did this. It's unusual situation, if this Dr. is doing what we are all think he is doing, he has more to loose than you, in my opinion. In any case, your priority is to find out what's on that LOR before considering an legal action, or what not.

Good Luck (you need it).

 

[drusier]

ok ok you really know the story...me and this guy were buddies when i first started living at his house. He is divorced and without kids. He liked the college life-stye had (i didnt ever party though, he just liked the chicks). One day he called my 20 year old gf and asked her to go out on the boat with him. I was like wtf and very polietly and respectfully asked him not to call my friends. He was embarassed. He asked my to move out shortly thereafter. Once moved out things were not great, he wouldnt foward my mail, etc. I saw a mutual friend of ours out one night and said "yea things went south, he became a real ass." That is ALL. This got back to him and he in turn took me to small claims court for back rent that origionally was to be covered by the above mentioned services I provided but after the g/f incident he asked for in cash (btw he never claimed my rental income). He really did become an ass at this point bulling me and we wound up in mediation with him asking for rent + carpet cleaning + interest + whatever else he felt like. We had no written contract and I was advised to let this go before a judge and that he didnt have a leg to stand on. Try to get rid od this guy, I agreed to pay for rent only (about 1/2 of what he was asking). He agreed. End of story for about a year. and yes i did receive an interview with out my LOR actually I received 5. anyways I calle his secretary about a week before this interview to have her as the Dr if he would sign off on my hours for this interview (my and the sec are still friends and talked for about 20mins. she returned to the phone to say he declined). No biggie. Until now. he knows this is the school i want to go to and further he is an alum and im sure anyone can go to the website and just get a schools address. Im really hoping someone knows if I can call them up and ask for this letter to be disregarded from my file and mail/faxed back to me...I have heard I have control of everything in that file. Any1 know?

 

[BeachLuvr]

Ohhh the nerve! I'm sorry you're having to go through all of this. Were I you, I'd call the school and explain the situation. Although, perhaps not in so much detail as that could make you look bad, inadvertantly. Ask them about removing the letter from your file, although as far as returning it back to you...that might not be feasible. In anycase, I'd ask for documentation from the school that the letter was recieved and who wrote the letter, and when it arrived. That isn't anything they wouldn't tell you over the phone, it'd just be in writing. Then you could use that information in seeking legal action against this troublemaker.

 

[Mo007]

The plot thickens...

Make arrangements to have access to your file, call the school, explain you have an LOR that shouldn't be there. Even though that could hurt your chances of getting in, you can explain your concerns to have this LOR on your file.

 

[Biogirl361]

i was going to say something about this dr, but i might be banned.
so, i will suffice to offer my sympathies about this situation and encourage you to get to the bottom of it. even if settling things legally isn't your style or you can't afford it, at least send a letter of explanation to each school and request the letter be thrown out. if you already got interviews then you know they are/were seriously considering you and they will take the time to read your letter of explanation and maybe sit down and talk to you on the phone about the situation. good luck man and i hope you get into your first choice despite this jerk. 😡

 

[g3k]

I second the action of talking about your situation to the schools which have got the letter.

 

[rocknightmare]

the nerve of some people. how cna somebody have time and energy to waste trying to bother other people, wouldn't have been better to use that time to learn a enw technique or learn something useful to get ahead in life.

 

[drusier]

the best way to get back at this guy is to get into this school and come out and become a successful dentist (maybe taking his clients?) Anyways Im just trying to figure out what im going to say. At this point I am only assuming this one school has the letter (god i hope). I probably just talk to the dean ( a feminst) and express what a womanizer this guy is

 

[trypmo]

You should be entitled to see the letter unless you've expressly signed a waiver of those rights for a letter from Dr. X specifically.

The waiver usually says something to the effect of:

"I hereby expressly waive any and all rights I might have to access this letter under the Family Rights and Privacy Act of 1977, and any or all other laws, regulations or policies. I understand that the rights I am waiving include, but are not limited to the right to inspect and review this statement, the right to have a copy of this statement made for my use, and the right to request an amendment to this statement."

So, assuming you did NOT sign such a waiver, apparently this means that under that Privacy Act you WOULD have the right to inspect, review, have a copy sent to you, and request an amendment to the statement for your file.

If in any doubt, definitely get a lawyer! But this could be a start on understanding what your rights probably are in this situation. I just got the above quote from some random web search optimized for the speed of posting it, so I suppose it would be wise of me to state that this is not meant to be legal advice of any kind.

Best of luck, friend!

 

[aphistis]

(maybe taking his clients?)

...we call them patients.

 

[boogaking]

First off... contacting the school is not going to make matters better... that part is out of your control... if you explain that particular story to the Adcom ...you will look like more trouble than good... schools don't like drama provoking stituations interrupting the outlook of their classes...

Second... you don't know whats in the letter... what if the letter is a genuine support letter...

My advice to you is to just swallow it ...if its bad... go on... everything happens for a reason... lesson learned... go on to the next dental school if you don't get into this one... I really hope you did apply to other schools.

 

[v&andy_yankee]

...this thread is a classic example of why it is so important to keep your professional life and your personal life in two separate categories. granted, you were only shadowing him, but your mistake was in having him as a landlord. where housing + money issues+ work==big troubles. and bad bad idea to introduce him to any of your parties, or your gf. i'm not saying this as a "you deserve this" because people usually aren't this nutty and situations don't get this crazy, but for the future, watch out: keep your personal life and your work life in two separate bins.

 

[Mo007]

boogaking

I dont think the OP should walk away without retaliation, and by all means get even with this guy... and I don't mean going over to this guy's house and beat him up... 😀, he should take some legal action (if what's on that LOR is dead-wrong!).

Just my opinion.

 

[Sprgrover]

Wow, that is shocking to say the least and very unprofessional. I hope that he has not sent a similar letter out to the other schools that you applied to. Best of luck dealing with this situation! 👍

 

[Dr.Smiley-OR]

First off... contacting the school is not going to make matters better... that part is out of your control... if you explain that particular story to the Adcom ...you will look like more trouble than good... schools don't like drama provoking stituations interrupting the outlook of their classes...

Second... you don't know whats in the letter... what if the letter is a genuine support letter...

My advice to you is to just swallow it ...if its bad... go on... everything happens for a reason... lesson learned... go on to the next dental school if you don't get into this one... I really hope you did apply to other schools.

I might agree with you that contacting the school is not going to make matters better and schools don't like drama provoking situations, but if DRUISER doesn't do anything (take any legal actions) then he has A LOT to loose. This dentist is a lunatic and he has the intention to damage this guy's record. There is no way that dentist would write a genuine support letter to DRUISER because after all he did decline to sign the paper that documents DRUISER has shadowed him for X hours. And, if I am that dentist and have taken someone to court, I wouldn't write a support letter to that person either. That action makes no sense because it's contradicting one another. I don't think this dentist has the mind to separate profesionall and personal matters apart. If he did, he wouldn't flirt with DRUISER's gf.
There are a lot at stake here for DRUISER, espeically if the dentist sent his letters to other schools. A LEGAL ACTION should be taken. However, I still agree with you that writing a letter to the admission committe might not be the best solution.
Good luck DRUISER! Man, this is crazy stuffs.