How do I ask for the LoRs I need?! I feel screwed out of my plans for life!

[cronus88]

How do I request letters of recommendations when I never got to know my philosophy professors on a personal level? What is the most polite way? I'm sure they remember me. I took so many damn philosophy classes. Yet I never really spoke to them due to social anxiety.

You see, I have always been an extremely shy and self-conscious person and had all sorts of issues relating to that during my undergraduate. It was pretty bad.

Only now am I beginning to change and work on myself, but unfortunately what is past is past. I've decided that I would like to go to grad school to get my master's [for the overall purpose of a stepping stone to a doctorate] in my field, however, most of the schools I plan on applying to require 2-3 letters of recommendations.

The good news is that I did very well in my major during undergrad since it is my passion, and I've saved almost all of my graded papers with great comments from my professors still on them.

I was wondering how I should go about asking them for letters of recommendation now, since I really need their help to help me achieve my life goal.

Should I just email each professors separately telling them who I am and my story and ask if they'd write a letter for me?

Or should I mail each one the request typed and printed out, along with a photo of me, and possibly the actual A-papers they've graded for me as proof of my ability?

Asking them in person is NOT an option. I am over a thousand miles away from my campus and broke.

Thanks a lot. I'm really confused as to how I should go about this. I've heard asking through email is rude and mailing them the request would be more appropriate, but I have no idea and would like some more opinions.

[runonsentence]

I've never heard that emailing could be rude, myself. Email would be my suggestion, but you could always call if you felt like email isn't the right thing to do here. (Though I realize that calling might be difficult for you, if you feel socially anxious...but if you're trying to turn that around, it might be an empowering way to start trying to change!)

I don't think that post is the way to go since they probably aren't in their offices much (if at all) over the summer and it could get lost in the campus mail shuffle during the school year. But if you do, I would NOT send ORIGINAL copies of any marked/graded papers—send photocopies instead.

There are a lot of threads in this forum you should poke around in to see how others have assembled materials to help their recommenders. But before you send on a packet of materials, I would first send an email that

• introduces yourself as a former student ("Because I was shy in undergrad, you may not remember me, but I took XXX class with you and really enjoyed it...").
  
• tells your prof that you're applying for grad school and why, and ask if s/he is comfortable writing you a strong letter of recommendation. Word it exactly like that so that your professor can take the out if s/he doesn't remember you well enough to write you a good letter.
  
• explains the reasons you've asked this particular professor to write for you. (If you're worried about a professor remembering you well, it will make it easier for them to imagine writing a letter for you if you can tell them what sorts of things you see them writing about. For instance, "I thought that my papers for your class really showed my understanding of XX theory..." or, "I thought that my participation in your course showed how passionate I was about the material and showed my potential for working with graduate-level ideas...".)
  
• tells her/him that if s/he can recommend you, you can send a packet of materials to them that includes the list of schools you're applying to, writing sample from her/his class, etc. by such-and-such date.
  

If you send out a feeler email like this beforehand, it won't look presumptuous (like you expect them to say yes—which could be the reason you've been advised against emailing in the past).

Good luck!

[cronus88]

Wow. I really appreciate your answer. It's been so hard to get somebody to give me some advice with this, yet alone someone who actually knows what they're talking about. What you say makes sense. I'm going to go ahead and do that. I also felt that it might be a bit strange for a professor to all of a sudden get a big packet in the mail without touching base beforehand.

Once again, thank you. Thank god I found this forum.

[runonsentence]

Glad it helped! And you may be surprised—perhaps your professors remember you better than you think they do.

[Two Espressos]

I've never heard that emailing could be rude, myself. Email would be my suggestion, but you could always call if you felt like email isn't the right thing to do here. (Though I realize that calling might be difficult for you, if you feel socially anxious...but if you're trying to turn that around, it might be an empowering way to start trying to change!)

I don't think that post is the way to go since they probably aren't in their offices much (if at all) over the summer and it could get lost in the campus mail shuffle during the school year. But if you do, I would NOT send ORIGINAL copies of any marked/graded papers—send photocopies instead.

There are a lot of threads in this forum you should poke around in to see how others have assembled materials to help their recommenders. But before you send on a packet of materials, I would first send an email that

• introduces yourself as a former student ("Because I was shy in undergrad, you may not remember me, but I took XXX class with you and really enjoyed it...").
  
• tells your prof that you're applying for grad school and why, and ask if s/he is comfortable writing you a strong letter of recommendation. Word it exactly like that so that your professor can take the out if s/he doesn't remember you well enough to write you a good letter.
  
• explains the reasons you've asked this particular professor to write for you. (If you're worried about a professor remembering you well, it will make it easier for them to imagine writing a letter for you if you can tell them what sorts of things you see them writing about. For instance, "I thought that my papers for your class really showed my understanding of XX theory..." or, "I thought that my participation in your course showed how passionate I was about the material and showed my potential for working with graduate-level ideas...".)
  
• tells her/him that if s/he can recommend you, you can send a packet of materials to them that includes the list of schools you're applying to, writing sample from her/his class, etc. by such-and-such date.
  

If you send out a feeler email like this beforehand, it won't look presumptuous (like you expect them to say yes—which could be the reason you've been advised against emailing in the past).

Good luck!

This is an excellent post! I won't have to worry about letters of recommendation for a while, but I'm definitely going to keep this advice in mind when I do!