why is it such a big deal that recommendation letters remain confidential?

[mrh125]

I don't understand it at all. what is the big deal of seeing what someone else wrote about you that affects your future? If you're having something written about you isn't it logical to be able to see it? I've emailed professors about getting copies of recommendation letters or a summary of what they said so that I could use them in the future and each one of them has responded in odd ways. One of them even said "Confidential is confidential. If you distrust the recommender, don't sign a waiver!"

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[SN12357]

I don't understand it at all. what is the big deal of seeing what someone else wrote about you that affects your future? If you're having something written about you isn't it logical to be able to see it? I've emailed professors about getting copies of recommendation letters or a summary of what they said so that I could use them in the future and each one of them has responded in odd ways. One of them even said "Confidential is confidential. If you distrust the recommender, don't sign a waiver!"

You don't understand how a person might write different things if they know the person they are talking about will see it vs. knowing they won't? Isn't that pretty obvious? People are far more willing to say negative things when their statements are confidential. Confidentiality is what gives recommendations teeth.

Some people DO offer up letters freely--I saw several of mine before they were submitted--but asking is not appropriate.

 

[witchbreath]

Instead of directly asking to see the letter, you can ask each professor if he is willing to write a 'good' recommendation; like you said, med school is a serious thing. If he is hesitant or seems to imply he would not write as good a letter as you'd like, you are then free to back out. Have a thick skin; who cares? Good luck.

 

[DWMontana]

This is to assure the recipient of the recommendation that the opinion is not being skewed by a student only turning in the best recommendations they can get. Forcing the student to make the decision without knowledge of what the reviewer may say makes the recommendation system much more representative of the student's actual prowess. There will always be exceptions, but the idea is that schools can go into it making the assumption that students who signed a waiver have received relatively unbiased recommendations.

I would agree with witchbreath on his suggestion and also add that I would not use the letter from the professor you quoted. That hostility would make me a bit nervous about what the letter might say, especially if they are still writing it.

 

[mrh125]

You don't understand how a person might write different things if they know the person they are talking about will see it vs. knowing they won't? Isn't that pretty obvious? People are far more willing to say negative things when their statements are confidential. Confidentiality is what gives recommendations teeth.

Some people DO offer up letters freely--I saw several of mine before they were submitted--but asking is not appropriate.

Ignoring your condescending tone it sounds like another silly academia formality and old school throwback honestly. If you're having something written about you a brief summary shouldn't be a big deal.

 

[mrh125]

This is to assure the recipient of the recommendation that the opinion is not being skewed by a student only turning in the best recommendations they can get. Forcing the student to make the decision without knowledge of what the reviewer may say makes the recommendation system much more representative of the student's actual prowess. There will always be exceptions, but the idea is that schools can go into it making the assumption that students who signed a waiver have received relatively unbiased recommendations.

I would agree with witchbreath on his suggestion and also add that I would not use the letter from the professor you quoted. That hostility would make me a bit nervous about what the letter might say, especially if they are still writing it.

yea, the hostility definitely doesn't help his case. I still can't help but question this considering I never had this issue with recommendation letters before, but ehh rolling with it.

 

[SN12357]

Ignoring your condescending tone it sounds like another silly academia formality and old school throwback honestly. If you're having something written about you a brief summary shouldn't be a big deal.

This is not an academic formality. The process of providing letters of rec are more formalized in academia but the principle of confidentiality when it comes to references and recommendations is pretty universal to the workplace.

As others said, nothing wrong with asking point-blank before the person commits if they are willing to write you a strong letter or not. But once they're written it, the waiver exists for a reason, and asking for the letter of rec is an inappropriate thing to do.

Ideally you should have the type of relationship with your letter writers where this is a nonissue, such that you know what they're going to write beforehand. If you honestly have doubts what they'd say...why are you asking them for a rec?

 

[kyamh]

Ignoring your condescending tone it sounds like another silly academia formality and old school throwback honestly. If you're having something written about you a brief summary shouldn't be a big deal.

I disagree, the whole point of recommendations is to find out what a person is really like outside of their interview face and what they put on their application. If applicants could tailor which recommendations they included with their applications, even just based off of the summaries, would allow them to skew the recommendations to align with the rest of their application or the opposite - write their application on the same themes. If someone says they love to mentor others, it comes off a lot stronger if one of the recommended also makes this observation....but the strength lies in the fact that the applicant should not know what their letters say and so the application and letter should only agree on things that are true.

Furthermore, if applicants can glean the tone of the recommendation and by so doing manage to eliminate bad letters, they are eliminating valuable critiques from their application...perhaps it is better for the applicant, but it is worse for the system.

Imagine an applicant cheated in some way in a course and did well overall, so they thought their professor never knew. Then the applicant goes to ask for a LOR and the professor accurately describes the offense. If the applicant knew that the professor wrote about the ethical misdemeanor, they would choose to not send the letter and thus sensor negative comments from their application. True story.

 

[Beargryllz]

Because any tool could just get infinity+1 letters, scour them, and toss out all but the 3 most flattering. Besides, if you don't trust the person writing your LOR, don't ask him/her for one. I've let a letter sit there for months and changed my mind about submitting it because the writer told me straightforward that he didn't think it would be a thorough appraisal. I didn't really have any rapport with him and I never communicated with him outside of class, so even though it could have worked, I declined to use it for my application.

 

[mcloaf]

it sounds like another silly academia formality and old school throwback honestly. If you're having something written about you a brief summary shouldn't be a big deal.

So basically what you're saying is that you didn't read any of the responses in this thread.

 

[rfvbnmju]

I don't want to see the letters when they're submitted. I want to see them after a successful cycle and matriculation when they don't matter anymore whether good or bad.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

 

[Gauss44]

IMO, encouraging confidential letters goes against:

1. Taking responsibility for what you say. Standing behind your word. Openness. (Hiding doesn't look good. It looks shady and sneaky. And weak.)
2. Diplomacy versus secrecy. I think diplomacy should win - and should be valued by the leaders of our profession.
3. Due process. Giving someone a chance to respond to what's said about them.
4. Transparency, a quality of a business that operates out in the open, rather than behind closed doors. The later is usually associated with "being up to no good."
5. Diversity. Secrecy allows discrimination to take place without being questioned or caught.

Confidential letters set a bad example. Everyone learns from example and from their leaders.

 

[SN12357]

IMO, encouraging confidential letters goes against:

1. Taking responsibility for what you say. Standing behind your word. Openness. (Hiding doesn't look good. It looks shady and sneaky. And weak.)
2. Diplomacy versus secrecy. I think diplomacy should win - and should be valued by the leaders of our profession.
3. Due process. Giving someone a chance to respond to what's said about them.
4. Transparency, a quality of a business that operates out in the open, rather than behind closed doors. The later is usually associated with "being up to no good."
5. Diversity. Secrecy allows discrimination to take place without being questioned or caught.


Confidential letters set a bad example. Everyone learns from example and from their leaders.

This is a lovely and noble sentiment with limited utility in the real world. Don't be simplistic; one can have confidential recommendations and still be transparent in other areas of business. Things are not that black and white.

Even with confidentiality people are bizarrely unwilling to say negative things about people. Without it letters of rec would have absolutely no purpose. Which hell, might be better (I've seen my share of positive letters that had no basis in reality) but if you're going to have them, they best be confidential.

In order for there to be honesty in non-confidential letters people would need to be ok with providing negative feedback. That's just not the way the world is wired; we are conditioned to be nice to other people, to feel bad about causing them harm of all sorts. That conditioning is a good thing most of the time, but then sometimes it's not. Sometimes it allows people to stay in roles they are grossly unsuited for because no one is willing to admit they suck at their job. Here's a true and common example for you: Daddy dearest gets his child a job through his connections. The child sucks at his job. Do you think that without confidentiality anyone is going to be willing to say even mediocre things about the child of powerful parents? Nope.

You think transparency on letters of rec would make things more meritocratic. That sword cuts both ways. At best it would be a wash; in my opinion it'd be a net negative in which the system would just be weighted even more towards people with stronger connections.

Now if you want to talk somewhere that DOES need greater transparency, IMO salaries should be public information and the fact that they are not breeds discrimination and bad management. But that's a whole other discussion. Because it's not one simple question where transparency = good and confidentiality = bad.

 

[PreMedMaverick]

IMO, encouraging confidential letters goes against:

1. Taking responsibility for what you say. Standing behind your word. Openness. (Hiding doesn't look good. It looks shady and sneaky. And weak.)
2. Diplomacy versus secrecy. I think diplomacy should win - and should be valued by the leaders of our profession.
3. Due process. Giving someone a chance to respond to what's said about them.
4. Transparency, a quality of a business that operates out in the open, rather than behind closed doors. The later is usually associated with "being up to no good."
5. Diversity. Secrecy allows discrimination to take place without being questioned or caught.

Confidential letters set a bad example. Everyone learns from example and from their leaders.

I think that all of these arguments are poor.

To provide counter-arguments, I would go back to the reason for the letter of recommendation. The purpose of an institution requesting a letter of recommendation is to obtain the ability to evaluate an objective analysis of a candidate's character, skills, abilities, etc.

Removing the confidentiality of the letter completely removes the sacred objectivity of the letter. Allowing the student to review and weigh in on the contents of the letter (or even withhold the letter, in light of its contents) completely defeats the purpose of the letter.

1. The letter writer's responsibility is to the institutions to whom he or she writes, not the student who requests the letter. The irresponsible thing to do would be to write lies to an institution to appease a student who requests a letter. Most letter writers have the humanity to tell a student they will not write a good letter if they are not capable of honestly producing a good letter. I think that action is sufficient in "taking responsibility" for what you say.

2. Not sure how diplomacy is ever relevant here. It is certainly not the opposite of secrecy.

3. This would only be true if letters of recommendation were the end all criterion by which candidates are judged. Since the letters are only part of the application process, due process is certainly given to all candidates (not that the applicants are accused of wrong-doing and due process is even relevant).

4. To say that transparency is usually good is to imply that privacy is usually bad. I am certain that is not the case. I think we can learn a lot from someone who cannot find 3 people they trust to write a few honest paragraphs about them without triggering some sort of alarm.

5. This is obviously a reach. I don't think discrimination can readily be hidden until a student is ready to request a letter of recommendation, then concentrated into one letter. The one person who i thought discriminated against me when I was an undergraduate was not asked to write me a letter of recommendation.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[Goro]

Concur 100% Confidentiality is also important because professors don't want student stalking or suing them for writng a bad one.

One should also keep in mind that a bad LOR is RARE. I see one maybe once an app cycle.

Just to give you some insights intot he process as well, If someone has lukewarm LORs I won't ding them. If they're all great, that's a plus.

Committee LORs can be more damaging. We routinely wait-list poeple who get, say a "recommend" when the top two levels are "Recommend as Excellent Candidate" or "Recommend as Outstanding Candidate"

I think that all of these arguments are poor.

To provide counter-arguments, I would go back to the reason for the letter of recommendation. The purpose of an institution requesting a letter of recommendation is to obtain the ability to evaluate an objective analysis of a candidate's character, skills, abilities, etc.

Removing the confidentiality of the letter completely removes the sacred objectivity of the letter. Allowing the student to review and weigh in on the contents of the letter (or even withhold the letter, in light of its contents) completely defeats the purpose of the letter.

1. The letter writer's responsibility is to the institutions to whom he or she writes, not the student who requests the letter. The irresponsible thing to do would be to write lies to an institution to appease a student who requests a letter. Most letter writers have the humanity to tell a student they will not write a good letter if they are not capable of honestly producing a good letter. I think that action is sufficient in "taking responsibility" for what you say.

2. Not sure how diplomacy is ever relevant here. It is certainly not the opposite of secrecy.

3. This would only be true if letters of recommendation were the end all criterion by which candidates are judged. Since the letters are only part of the application process, due process is certainly given to all candidates (not that the applicants are accused of wrong-doing and due process is even relevant).

4. To say that transparency is usually good is to imply that privacy is usually bad. I am certain that is not the case. I think we can learn a lot from someone who cannot find 3 people they trust to write a few honest paragraphs about them without triggering some sort of alarm.

5. This is obviously a reach. I don't think discrimination can readily be hidden until a student is ready to request a letter of recommendation, then concentrated into one letter. The one person who i thought discriminated against me when I was an undergraduate was not asked to write me a letter of recommendation.

Just my 2 cents.