Choosing Third LOR

[child of 2]

For two of my LOR's I'm choosing my two research professors. For my third one, it's more of a toss up.

1. I got my academic adviser who offered to write me a letter. But I took her class freshmen year, and we didn't really speak for 3 years since then.

2. I started TAing recitation and lab for chemistry, and there are two professors who teach this class. The problem is we don't get a lot of face time. We have weekly staff meetings, and we grade exams together as a group until they're done. That's about it.

3. There's a professor with whom I have taken 3 classes. I got B+ on the first two, and I'm currently taking the third one. She knows I work hard, and she's a nice person.

Should I talk with all three prospects and make a decision based on their reaction, or is there advantage of choosing one over the other? I don't want to ask for a letter, and then not use it. Any advice?

Edited October 17, 2012 by child of 2

[MCS_aspirant]

In my humble opinion, if you got stellar grades overall, go for number 1. Your academic advisor can put your grades into perspective, and talk about how hard it is to score as high as you have. This will ensure your grades are well-earned, and your institution just doesn't give away A's (some schools do). Since you have two letters coming from research professors, it would be a good balance to have one letter justifying your curricular achievements.

If not, then one of your supervisors for your TAship would be nice. If my understanding is correct, you are not just a 'grader', but a 'TA' who holds recitations and/or office hours etc. It will help if TAship is one of your potential funding source for grad school.

I am not very optimistic about the third option you mentioned. Sorry to be blatant- but working hard and still getting B+ (as you mentioned) may not be looked upon very favorably by the reviewers. Best of luck!

[child of 2]

thank you!

my adviser knows I had a bad semester, where I dropped out and became a part time student for a semester due to personal reasons. I also have some really bad grades coming into college from high school in higher level math such as diff eq and linear algebra (these classes were retaken). I think all of these can be red flags, and my adviser might be the only person who can mention this and shed some positive light in the LOR.

So I don't have stellar grades. I have a 3.5 cum gpa and 3.6 core gpa. I've always been busy either playing club sports or working. There are things I definitely would have done differently.

---------

by the way. you applied for two different departments in the same school? (MIT m e and aero e) Did you have to pay twice the application fee, and what drove you to apply to both departments? I'm asking because I'm interested in polymers, and some universities have their own polymer program, in addition to the chem e program.

[MCS_aspirant]

thank you!

my adviser knows I had a bad semester, where I dropped out and became a part time student for a semester due to personal reasons. I also have some really bad grades coming into college from high school in higher level math such as diff eq and linear algebra (these classes were retaken). I think all of these can be red flags, and my adviser might be the only person who can mention this and shed some positive light in the LOR.

So I don't have stellar grades. I have a 3.5 cum gpa and 3.6 core gpa. I've always been busy either playing club sports or working. There are things I definitely would have done differently.

---------

by the way. you applied for two different departments in the same school? (MIT m e and aero e) Did you have to pay twice the application fee, and what drove you to apply to both departments? I'm asking because I'm interested in polymers, and some universities have their own polymer program, in addition to the chem e program.

Now I feel like your advisor can explain your bad semester, and the fact that you could have done better. But be sure to ask around for more opinions.

--------

I had to pay app fee twice (some schools allow multiple apps for the same fee, MIT is not one of them). I applied to MIT aero and ME because MIT was my dream school, and MIT ME has very strong research in my subfield compared to MIT aero. I didn't get into MIT aero anyway even though I was an aero undergrad.

[child of 2]

ok mucho thank you