 Are you anxious about asking for those letters of recommendation stick around on how to best prep for the process and to learn about the key moments that you need to kind of be aware of. For the best personal statement coaching make sure that you subscribe and hit that bell so you don't lose out on any videos I post every Tuesday. There are four steps that you want to take into account when submitting and asking for your letters of recommendation. Hi I am Dr. Josie with Write Your Acceptance as a university faculty member who writes letters every year for students and as a personal statement coach I know how to help you maximize your candidacy and letters of recommendation are essential to that kind of whole package so stick around. Step one find out who should be writing your letters of recommendation right so ideally you are kind of generating a list a thoughtful list and you want to have a couple of science professors a non-science professor a researcher perhaps or and a community leader that you volunteered under that you've cultivated a relationship with. So bonus and this is not to worry anyone that doesn't have this but if you have a relationship with a professor or a professional in the university that you are applying to that would be a great letter to have that's definitely an advantage but you want to make sure it's someone that actually knows you right you don't want a generic letter from someone that can kind of just stamp the university name on your recommendation letter that's not really going to help. Also some students um and kind of pre-health advisors I've I've spoken to have mentioned if you know someone like a famous researcher um that um that is kind of relevant timely today um that may be of interest but again I always always come back to simplicity and authenticity for my students so you want to make sure that these are um individuals and professionals professors who truly know you and can advocate towards who you are and and just kind of show you in the best most detailed light. Step two contact them early so um it doesn't matter if it's a doctor that you shadowed a professor a community organizer a leader that you cultivated a relationship with you want to make sure that you are giving them a lot like ample time so basically you know I'm a little extra so I would say at least four weeks in anticipation I will tell you I they all kind of tend to add up all at the round the same time and it's the worst when a student kind of you know emails and says oh miss but can I have it in five days and I'm like tough tough because it's a disservice to you so you want to give the your recommenders your letter writers um ample time to really kind of think through what they're gonna say kind of add in details key moments that they remember and takeaways of your time together so the more time that you give them the better it is for the kind of strength of the letter also you don't have to give them you know four or five weeks and then you're just kind of like you email them or you go in person to office hours and then you're like biting your nails waiting to hear you can kind of nudge them give them a friendly reminder and you know two weeks in or two weeks before ideally you're you're kind of receiving the letters another pointer is to kind of ask for more letters than you need kind of the stock requirement is three letters for schools but first disclaimer you want to make sure that you go into each of schools guidelines and make sure how many letters and what kinds of letters they need but kind of usually it's three letters but I would ask for at least five letters you want to make sure you know sometimes a professor won't come through won't come through in time but you can also pick and choose which letters go to which school so then you want to make sure if it's a very kind of research driven institution or there's a research kind of you know project that you're very interested in maybe a letter goes into that one that you know and then a humanities letter goes into another school so you can kind of pick and choose and strategize what kind of your packet looks like so if you have more letters you have more options okay so from a professor's point of view let me tell you kind of what I go through so when a student asks me and I say yes yes sometimes I say no and I'll tell you why but give me a second give me a second so I usually kind of go back to all the work that they did in my class not only the grades but I'll go back to the essays I'll go back to my comments and really kind of refresh on the type of rapport we had but also the type of student they were in the class and and that's kind of always helpful because I'd like to put in very specific details on kind of memorable experiences in the classroom so that takes time one and two from a student perspective I love when students not only send me their resume most students will be like you know send me an attached resume and that's great but I am reading this document their resume cold so I rather that students kind of on top of giving me their resume write in the email or give me in person two or three kind of memorable moments memorable moments from our class together and that kind of refreshes my memory but also tells me what they took away from our class and and I can bring in some of that content as well into the letter and so that's great color and great detail and and it's the student kind of helping advance the the essay so yes sometimes I say no and you know like many of the kind of moments and crossroads that you find yourself in on the pre-med journey I would say don't take it personally if you do get to know sometimes first I know that a lukewarm or generic not even negative negative obviously kind of is terrible but a lukewarm unenthusiastic letter it's going to do more harm than good for the for the student so if I say no it's really because I just don't feel that I have the content to be as compelling as possible to recommend a student I don't know them enough I didn't like have you know outside the classroom experiences report during office hours or something that I just don't have enough to kind of wrap my kind of um content around that that makes it a compelling letter so um yes it would be extra work to to ask for someone else but sometimes that's the better fit also I always ask um you know the timeline because if I have three five days and sometimes I do I will say no if I just don't have the time because if I don't have the time to dedicate to a robust kind of thoughtfully crafted letter then I am doing a disservice to the student and I would rather say no then um then kind of do that kind of harm potential harm to an application um and so that's why another reason to ask more more professors or more kind of you know individuals that are writers then um then what you need so that you can kind of then play around with the number two so step three is know the process um yes you can since your application can be verified without the letters of recommendation most letters of recommendation are really kind of taken into account um with the secondaries and kind of in the second round right so um yes you can turn your application in before the letters are in and since most schools um are rolling admission time is of the essence and the earlier you apply the better um you want to make sure that that's not an excuse to slack you want to give people time you want to give them ample time you want to get on it yesterday right if you need them and time is of the essence also you want to make sure that you kind of figure out what processes are available and services are available in your schools um there are you can kind of upload up to 10 letters but really it's 10 letter types so there are individual letters there are committee letters um and so if you have a pre-health office um in your school sometimes the process is that they will kind of interview you and compile a packet for you right and so then all the letters that you um bring together they'll kind of bring um they'll put together and then turn that into to MCAS for you um so like as a as a whole um and so that can take a little longer than if you are individually uploading your essays um but you want to make sure that um that is as streamlined as possible and um and really it kind of um advocates for you in a cohesive like strong kind of voice unified voice um as a school so that I think is also great are you nervous about asking for recommendation letters or did you already ask for them and you have a um terrible experience you want to share comment below we'd love to kind of give you some support step four is the osteo-replicant writing your own letter oh my type thing so this is like a catch all step so if you are applying to MD and DO schools you want to make sure that you kind of um enlist a third-party service like Interfolio um to kind of help you organize your lists and then distribute um your letters and so um the great thing about Interfolio is that they hold the letters for more than a year um however if you are re-applicant my suggestion is that you ask for your letters again and you kind of connect with those letter writers give them an update of what you've been doing for the last year give them again memorable experiences whether um with that professor or with that letter writer and then during the year that you've been kind of um in the application season that you're before so you want to make sure that you are giving them personalized feedback so that they can just kind of make that letter stronger for you and then yes sometimes it will happen that professors or letter writers will say oh just write it for me and then I will kind of tweak it approve it and then kind of send it off and if that is the case um that does happen you want to make sure that you have um very detailed but very kind of you know I met so and so so um you're writing about yourself in the third person if you want more guidance on the letters or if you want um more guidance and expert strategies for your personal statement definitely book a one-on-one call with me it's in the description below the link and if you like this video if you found it helpful please give us a like please comment below helpful and more will come with at you soon thank you so much for watching I'll see you bye