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advice needed


frankdux

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over a month ago i asked one of my LOR writers to write me one final LOR. i shot him an email asking. he said no problem. a week later i asked him if it was still alright. he said he'd do it soon.

4 weeks go by. last week i call this last school i'm applying to. they still dont have his LOR.

i emailed him again about 4 days ago asking if he could get around to it sometime very soon. no response.

what next? email him again? (maybe he was at a conference?) do i risk bothering him? (maybe i could write him just one final email maybe on tuesday saying it would be ok if he couldnt do it but that i wanted to email him one final time to make sure, in case he didnt receive my last email?) or should i just go on to someone else. i do have a 4th person who could write me a letter who wrote one for one school for me this year, but it would be much weaker LOR.

this school wont be reviewing apps til the end of the month, or beginning of april.

UPDATE: i emailed him over the weekend. he apologized and said he would do it. I called the school today. They STILL haven't received his letter. do i bother him again? I dont wanna piss off the professor in case i need him to write me more letters next year. do i just let it go?

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I would definitely call, shoot him another e-mail, or ask him in person. He said he would write you a letter of recommendation for you and it is not wrong of you to make sure that it gets to the graduate admissions committee in time. Did you tell him what the deadline was? He may be procrastinating because he knows that the admin committee won't be reviewing apps until later this month that he is putting it off. Two of my LoR writers didn't turn in their LoRs until a day before the due date (I'm applying to the school that they teach at), so he may think that he has more time.

In the mean time, though, I would definitely ask the other person to write you a LoR. If anything, that person can be used as a supplementary recommendation to be used in your favor. Ask the admin secretary if they take supplementary recommendations. If they do you're good to go and don't have to worry too much about your procrastinating prof. However, if they don't ask them if you can withdraw it should your other LoR show up.

This is about you and your future, so don't be afraid to be assertive and go for what you need. No one will blame you for it.

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Something similar happened to me, where one of my recommenders disappeared (turns out, for health reasons). When it began to be very late, I lined up another recommender who had written me a similar letter previously, and could just tweak it to fit the new purpose. I let him know what was going on, picked a date to cut the cord with the other recommender and move on with the new one (based on the deadline), and then ended up calling him to say, "we're on, please send the letter on the date we agreed on."

Could it also be that the program you applied to has a slow process? Mine weren't recorded as "received" for a while after my recommenders actually sent them.

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Yes, I had a similar experience with one of mine who went MIA on me...

do you have a telephone number? Can you call him? I would definitely send him another e-mail - it's possible that he missed the first one if he gets a lot of e-mails.

Best of luck!

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I had a similar situation as well. The professor told me he would have it done three weeks before it was due, then it was two weeks before, then it was a week before. The week it was due he still had not completed them, so I literally went and sat outside his office until he finished them.

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I would go ask in person: It's easy to ignore and/or forget emails. (One of my professor told me not to be afraid to bug him because he tends to forget and procrastinate).

I agree with the above. Go see him in person and ask.

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I would ask both professors, just to cover all the bases. I would remind the professor you asked earlier and inquire with the other professor as well. This way, you'll have the required numbers of letters to have your application reviewed. And if both professors do happen to promptly write letters for you, you will have an extra letter for the application (which is permitted by some schools).

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UPDATE: i emailed him over the weekend. he apologized and said he would do it. I called the school today. They STILL haven't received his letter. do i bother him again? I dont wanna piss off the professor in case i need him to write me more letters next year. do i just let it go?

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