Prof going to new school,what to do about recommendation

[pbehzad]

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Well I was planning on asking my chem prof for a recommendation, but i have heard that she may be moving to another school next year. I am wondering what should i do as far as asking her for a recommendation. I'll be a junior so ill be applying to medical school next year. I was really hoping to get a rec from her cause she knows me pretty well. Is it possible to still get a recommendation from her if she is at another school? I do have some other profs that will prolly be able to write me a recommendation,but i was for sure going to get this prof. This may be stupid to ask, but would it really matter if she wrote the letter on the other schools letterhead? Thanks

 

[vixenell]

Contact her and ask her to write it anyway... this happened when I needed a rec for college; most won't mind, as long as you ask well ahead of time.

 

[pbehzad]

*bump*
oh come on, someone else has to have some other advice. please help, thanks

 

[DW]

dr thornton maybe? 😉

anyways, i would just ask her before she leaves if she'd be willing to write a letter, not necessarily now, but just tell her so you can exchange contact info with her and keep in touch. same thing kinda happened to me and i had to get a letter from a prof who left two years before i applied. I really dont think it being on a different letterhead would make any difference as long as its clear in the letter whan the writer's relationship was to you.

just tell her you'd like to keep in contact now, and she can write the letter sometime in the next year 🙂

 

[LetMeInPlease]

Two of my recoommendationswere from professors who were no longer teaching at my school. One had just taught a single class and worked full time at NIH, so I contacted him through his work e-mail and he was more than happy to do it. I just had to scan the recommendation form into a PDF and e-mail it to him.

The other guy had just taught one class at my school and was on the faculty at a nearby college, so I contacted him through his school e-mail and reminded him who I was and he was also fine with the whole thing.

The only difference in asking these professors verses asking professors who were still on faculty was that I didn't get to ask them in person. I felt a bit bad not being able to ask in person, but they didn't seem to mind.

 

[brats800]

i'm in the same situation and i plan on emailing my prof at his new school and just asking for him to write a letter of recommendation. i asked my premed advisor about this and she said that medschools would totally be fine with it, especially if its a good LOR 😉

 

[Verite]

Hi,

At my school (U. of Maryland), we can pretty much request letters of recommendations anytime starting from our freshmen year.

The letters are compiled into a database in our name...so that when it's time to apply, we have gathered tons of letters throughout the year.

I think this is probably the case at your school also, check with your pre-med advising office.

If your advising office doesn't collect letters like this (which would be odd IMO), check out the numerous "Letter of Rec" services offered. These companies receive letters directly from your recommender so it's "officially" genuine. This way, you can just have these service send the letters to your pre-med office when it's time.

Again, it's best to take this question to your pre-med advising office.

Good luck.

- Verite

 

[Sonya]

i see no problem in using that professor. Just be sure to keep in contact with him. Let him know you will be asking for a rec letter. I'm not sure if getting a rec letter ahead of time is a good idea...

Sonya