Writing your own LOR

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
sunshine02

sunshine02

Full Member
10+ Year Member
Joined
Mar 25, 2012
Messages
710
Reaction score
139
Members don't see this ad.
I know this has been talked about many times, but I'm really at a loss for what to do. A professor who claims that he really wasn't that busy but only wants to write letters for those who've taken multiple classes with him asked me to write my own. I don't even know where to begin. Personally, I have finals in the next few weeks and still need to work on my PS. I guess I just feel really uncomfortable because if he isn't willing to write the LOR himself, even when he's not busy, then perhaps it's going to be a very mediocre letter. I went to office hours multiple times and have done well in the class. Perhaps he doesn't think highly of me? I wanted to get some opinion here--do you think I should find a different professor? That would be hard since I go to a huge school where most science classes are around 300-500 people. I just feel lost about this situation..
 
sunshine02 said:
I know this has been talked about many times, but I'm really at a loss for what to do. A professor who claims that he really wasn't that busy but only wants to write letters for those who've taken multiple classes with him asked me to write my own. I don't even know where to begin. Personally, I have finals in the next few weeks and still need to work on my PS. I guess I just feel really uncomfortable because if he isn't willing to write the LOR himself, even when he's not busy, then perhaps it's going to be a very mediocre letter. I went to office hours multiple times and have done well in the class. Perhaps he doesn't think highly of me? I wanted to get some opinion here--do you think I should find a different professor? That would be hard since I go to a huge school where most science classes are around 300-500 people. I just feel lost about this situation..
Click to expand...
If you write it for him, it will be worse than a mediocre letter. You will not use the same language and emphasis that an experienced letter writer has to offer. And heaven help you if an adcomm reader recognizes that the style is not similar to that of the same author's previous submissions.
 
sunshine02 said:
I know this has been talked about many times, but I'm really at a loss for what to do. A professor who claims that he really wasn't that busy but only wants to write letters for those who've taken multiple classes with him asked me to write my own. I don't even know where to begin. Personally, I have finals in the next few weeks and still need to work on my PS. I guess I just feel really uncomfortable because if he isn't willing to write the LOR himself, even when he's not busy, then perhaps it's going to be a very mediocre letter. I went to office hours multiple times and have done well in the class. Perhaps he doesn't think highly of me? I wanted to get some opinion here--do you think I should find a different professor? That would be hard since I go to a huge school where most science classes are around 300-500 people. I just feel lost about this situation..
Click to expand...

Find a new person to write you a LOR. You can do a decent job writing your own and having someone else edit, but this doesn't sound like someone who feels comfortable writing on your behalf. Stay away from it.
 
Funny, my brother had a new MD faculty member with whom he did a year long project ask him to draft his own LOR, as he only wrote letters for medical students going to residency, not kids going to medical school and he didn't know what to say. My dad (a very experienced faculty member) wrote a draft for my brother to give to his new faculty member mentor. The new faculty member was so excited now to have a "draft" he could tweak for future undergraduate students. Needless to say, we know what that one said. Sometimes faculty are just clueless and need help (which they don't ask for from their colleagues, which is what they should do). My brother wouldn't have been able to write this either on his own and just lucked out having a faculty member as his parent who knew what the med admissions are looking for in research letters.
 
Some professors have this policy in general and it honestly comes across as lazy to me. My PI had this policy for everyone and I didn't ask her for an LOR. I agree with others above that if they are not willing to put in the time to write a letter for you than don't bother getting one from them.
 
Pasmal said:
Prof clearly stated he doesn't know you well enough to feel comfortable writing you a good LOR. Look elsewhere.
Click to expand...
He didn't clearly state that. But yeah I think he's insinuating that
 
kevinsword91 said:
Some professors have this policy in general and it honestly comes across as lazy to me. My PI had this policy for everyone and I didn't ask her for an LOR. I agree with others above that if they are not willing to put in the time to write a letter for you than don't bother getting one from them.
Click to expand...

It looks incredibly odd to do a substantial amount of research with someone and not have a letter from them. Will it sink an application, probably not. But, at the more research oriented schools, it can definitely be brought up. Some PIs are busy. Some want to see what you are looking for and/or think that they can be more helpful if you have a more direct input and yes, some are lazy. Even if it is pure laziness, not getting a letter from someone that you should is a bad sign. Again, not application sinking, but certainly sub optimal. The same goes for residency and home program directors/chairman etc. for competitive specialties.
 
I say just write it. I would feel INCREDIBLY uncomfortable writing my own letter (yikes, SO glad I don't have to do it). However, I don't think there's anything horrendously dishonest about it. The reason: the professor is going to read through the letter of recommendation you wrote anyways. If he sees something that he very well disagrees with or does not think is true, he might change it. Regardless, he is going to end up signing his name away, affirming the words in it. So although he may not have written the letter of recommendation himself, he has indeed read the letter and given it the okay.

Again, I would feel really uncomfortable writing my own letter and would probably just find a professor who knows me well enough to write me one. However, I don't think there is anything wrong with writing your own letter SO LONG AS the professor reads what you say and agrees with what was written enough to sign it. If he knows you so little so as to not even know if what you write is true/false, then I do feel that writing your own letter of recommendation, knowing that he/she will sign off on it no matter what with no changes is immoral.
 
KungFuPanda123 said:
I say just write it. I would feel INCREDIBLY uncomfortable writing my own letter (yikes, SO glad I don't have to do it). However, I don't think there's anything horrendously dishonest about it. The reason: the professor is going to read through the letter of recommendation you wrote anyways. If he sees something that he very well disagrees with or does not think is true, he might change it. Regardless, he is going to end up signing his name away, affirming the words in it. So although he may not have written the letter of recommendation himself, he has indeed read the letter and given it the okay.

Again, I would feel really uncomfortable writing my own letter and would probably just find a professor who knows me well enough to write me one. However, I don't think there is anything wrong with writing your own letter SO LONG AS the professor reads what you say and agrees with what was written enough to sign it. If he knows you so little so as to not even know if what you write is true/false, then I do feel that writing your own letter of recommendation, knowing that he/she will sign off on it no matter what with no changes is immoral.
Click to expand...
No I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it. I just feel like others could do a better job, especially experienced faculty who have written letters before. I don't even know where to start with writing my own letter. All the templates online suck. I'm seriously considering someone else but I just don't know who. 🙁 All my other professors are either gone or don't know me well since they only taught 4 lectures in the course with multiple professors.

Also, what could I include that won't already be talked about by my other writers? I'm just stressed about having to write my own letter, my PS, study for my finals, and work on other papers. He even said he'll probably rewrite what I wrote anyways. If that's the case, wouldn't it have made more sense for him to write it in the first place.
 
Rainbow Zebra said:
Funny, my brother had a new MD faculty member with whom he did a year long project ask him to draft his own LOR, as he only wrote letters for medical students going to residency, not kids going to medical school and he didn't know what to say. My dad (a very experienced faculty member) wrote a draft for my brother to give to his new faculty member mentor. The new faculty member was so excited now to have a "draft" he could tweak for future undergraduate students. Needless to say, we know what that one said. Sometimes faculty are just clueless and need help (which they don't ask for from their colleagues, which is what they should do). My brother wouldn't have been able to write this either on his own and just lucked out having a faculty member as his parent who knew what the med admissions are looking for in research letters.
Click to expand...
Hmm perhaps, but he's been a faculty member for a long time. My dad is a prof, and the funny thing is, before I posted this, I had asked him if he could write it and I'll edit it a bit and send it to the professor but he said he wasn't comfortable with that :/
 
sunshine02 said:
Hmm perhaps, but he's been a faculty member for a long time. My dad is a prof, and the funny thing is, before I posted this, I had asked him if he could write it and I'll edit it a bit and send it to the professor but he said he wasn't comfortable with that :/
Click to expand...
That is funny, and yes, my dad has been a faculty member since 1997. My dad writes LORs for tons of people, so has templates for undergrads, med students, residents and fellows, just fills in the blanks, then adds a few "special" paragraphs to personalize. Ultimately, it is the signer who should edit it, but some new MD don't really "teach", they just have folks in their labs/clinics doing projects, so they are pretty clueless on the LOR stuff. Most faculty in other academic departments probably are better about their mentoring responsibilities than MDs in hospitals.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

I
pre-writing secondaries
Replies
4
Views
802
MD_Maker
MD_Maker
M
Updating LOR writers
Replies
2
Views
473
Manifesting_MDs
M
A
Writing Update Letters
Replies
14
Views
3K
Mr.Smile12
Mr.Smile12
M
Writing LOI to Weill
Replies
13
Views
1K
LizzyM
LizzyM
S
LOR Advice
Replies
6
Views
691
PagingDrMe
P
Top