How To Secure Your Medical School Letters of Recommendation with Dr. Jasmine Weiss

Unlock the secrets to securing your future in medicine with our latest episode, where Dr. Jasmine Weiss lends her expertise on how to obtain the strongest letters of recommendation for your medical school application. With Dr. Weiss's guidance, you'll grasp not only the 'whos' and 'hows' but also the critical 'whys' of picking the right endorsers. We dissect the significance of each recommendation, ensuring that you approach the right mix of professors, mentors, and professionals who can vouch for both your academic prowess and your character. Dr. Weiss also navigates us through the finer points of the logistics, from what materials to hand your recommenders to gracefully handling the delicate situation where you might need to draft your own letter. This is a masterclass in making sure your application letters resonate with authenticity and personal connection.

Step into our mentorship clinic as we share strategies to build and maintain relationships with the very people who will champion your medical school ambitions. Dr. Weiss reveals the art of regular, meaningful communication with mentors, stressing the impact of keeping them informed with quarterly updates on your academic and personal growth. These relationships are not just fleeting contacts but long-term investments in your future—the difference between a generic endorsement and a compelling, detailed testimony to your potential. Be sure to tune in, join the conversation, and take away invaluable tips that will help you secure the golden tickets to your dream med school. Remember, it's not just about obtaining a letter; it's about crafting a narrative of excellence that admissions committees can't ignore.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

So you're preparing for your medical school application and you're making a checklist and you realize you need letters of recommendation. And then you freeze because you haven't talked to any faculty about writing you a letter of recommendation. So on today's episode, I'm going to give you some key strategies to help make sure you get those letters of recommendation for your medical school application. First, I need you to follow us on YouTube at BlackMedConnect, and let's jump right into the episode. Hello everyone, welcome back to the Black Med Connect podcast. I'm your host, dr Jasmine Weiss, and today we're going to talk all about how to make sure you get those letters of recommendation that you need for your medical school application. So a few questions that I want to first get out the way are how many letters of recommendation do you need Generally for the medical school application process? You'll need anywhere from four to five letters of recommendation. You're gonna need two from science professors that you've taken classes with, and you'll likely need one from a professor who's not a science professor. Some schools don't require you to have a non-science letter of recommendation, so that's one to just keep, just in case you need it. And you can always go to the school websites that you're applying to, to see if that's a requirement for that specific school. The other letter of recommendation that you'll need comes from someone who you may have had a research experience with a faculty member or you've done an internship with. It may even come from the person you've shadowed with if you've done any type of clinical experiences. So that is your additional letter of recommendation, and sometimes you may actually need two of those. So, again, you'll need anywhere from three to four recommendation letters, or three to five recommendation letters, depending on the schools you'll be applying to. So how do you go about actually getting these letters of recommendation? The first strategy I want you to use is to think about which faculty members you've actually spent time with or actually engaged with or interacted with. Don't make the mistake of being like some students I know who have only met with you one time and you don't really know them very well. But boom, out pops an email that says hi, dr Weiss, can I get a letter of recommendation from you? If I can't be sure that you're gonna get a strong letter of recommendation from you, I personally probably wouldn't write it for you. So that leads me right into my next tip.

Speaker 1: 2:47

Once you think about which faculty members you've engaged with before and interacted with, you now need to ask them for the letter of recommendation. There's a few things you can do. You can first just email them and ask them if they can meet with you to discuss your plans of applying to medical school and then, during the meeting, you can actually ask them if they would be willing to write you a strong letter of recommendation. I can't emphasize enough the importance of you asking for a strong letter. Don't just ask for a letter because you want to see how they react to you. If they say, oh yes, absolutely I'll write you that letter, I'm excited about it for you, I know you're going to do well, then that's a letter that you actually can count on, being written with lots of strong adjectives and really highlighting you as a person. If a person is like, well, I'm not sure, I'm not sure that I can be the person that's going to write it for you, automatically just say thank you, I appreciate it, but you should know in the back of your mind that you're not necessarily going to use that particular letter of recommendation. Again, you want to make sure that you stand out, so you want people who are not just going to write for you, but who are going to be excited to share about who you are.

Speaker 1: 4:06

When medical schools are looking at these letters, they are evaluating the fact that these are other people sharing their experiences with you. So they do hold a lot of weight. Or there is some emphasis on the letter of recommendation and people take those words into really deep consideration because they know these are individuals who've gotten to know you on a deeper level and those people can really speak to who you are and what you're trying to accomplish level and those people can really speak to who you are and what you're trying to accomplish. So make sure tip number two that you ask for a strong letter of recommendation from the individuals that you are asking for recommendations from. The third tip I have for you is to make sure you ask them how do they want to handle the logistics around writing your letter.

Speaker 1: 4:51

There are a few different ways that faculty members and individuals who are in charge of research programs will approach writing letters. For some they'll say well, just give me a copy of your CV and a draft of your personal statement and I'll draft a letter for you. Others will actually ask you to write the letter of recommendation and I've had this happen to me before where you're like how am I supposed to write myself a letter of recommendation? It's not the easiest thing to do, but what I want you to do when you go about writing this letter on behalf of someone else, I want you to think about the framework of letting that person introduce themselves, so writing a sentence about who they are and the fact that they are writing a letter on behalf of your name right, insert your name. They're writing the letter on behalf of you and they are recommending you as a strong applicant to medical school.

Speaker 1: 5:45

You can use language that's really positive and strong adjectives as you are describing yourself, because you're really highlighting to them, when they go back to read the letter, that this is the type of wording that you would hope to have in the letter of recommendation. So when you're writing it on behalf of yourself, you can also highlight three or four key experiences that you've had, how you know the faculty member, and remember you're writing this as if you are them. Right, you're writing it as if you're the faculty member, so you wanna make sure you include how they know you, what some of the strengths they may have seen coming from you and why they think you'll be a great candidate for medical school. Ultimately, this is just a draft and you'll be able to send it back to the faculty member, and it does give them a nice base so that they can go back and add on top of what you've written. So don't feel like this is something that's totally out of the ordinary. This does happen where individuals ask you to write the first draft of the letter of recommendation.

Speaker 1: 6:46

The next tip I have for you is to come up with the follow-up plan to make sure you get your letter of recommendation on time. Make sure you ask the faculty member or the person who is your mentor how many weeks do you think you need before you want me to send you a brief reminder and you can say I don't want to pester you, I just want to make sure you. I know you're busy and you have a lot going, so I want to make sure I help you to get the letter in on time. I've had instances where individuals have not provided me with the letter of recommendation I've asked for, and so I want you to make sure you really go back and ask the questions about what's. When do you want reminders or when should I expect the letter back from you? And you can even go as far to say if they're submitting it on their own. You can let them know you'd like the letter to be submitted by a specific date and give yourself an additional five days, or tell them you know this is the date for submission, even though you know that you have a few more days before you actually wanna submit your application. That way you have some buffer time. I'll be honest I, as the faculty member, as the mentor, have been the person who has submitted it early for a student and have also been the person who submitted it the day of. So it's not because we don't want to submit a letter for you. It may just be because we've gotten really busy. So I know I personally appreciate those reminders and it's really important to make sure you ask those individuals if they want the reminders as well. So I've shared a few key tips with you.

Speaker 1: 8:17

Number one make sure you choose your letter writers wisely. Who have you built rapport with? Are you making sure you get two letter recommendations from science faculty members and one from a non-science faculty member? Are you making sure you get an extracurricular letter, maybe from a research mentor or somebody who supported you in an extracurricular activity. Are you making sure to ask them for a strong letter? Don't forget, use that word and they'll know why you're using the word a strong letter of recommendation. Forget, use that word and they'll know why you're using the word A strong letter of recommendation. And then, have you figured out exactly how you're going to go about approaching writing the letter? Are they going to write it for you or do they expect you to draft the first draft? And lastly, what are the logistics around making sure you actually get the letter when you need it?

Speaker 1: 9:03

Remember, faculty members are used to writing these letters, so you're not bothering them, especially if you were a great student or a great research mentee.

Speaker 1: 9:28

They want to support you on the journey, so be sure to go them with emails as you go and they'll know when you go back to ask them for the letter. They'll be able to say you stayed connected with them. So that's a little bonus tip. Make sure you identify letter writers, even years in advance if you need to, and stay connected quarterly or every few months, just so they can remain up to date. So when it's time for them to write the letter, they're ready to do so. I hope these tips were helpful as you go about asking people for letters of recommendation. I know it feels a little bit uncomfortable, but remember mentors are looking to do it, and so always remember you can't get there without the help of others, and so these letters are just one of the tickets you need to get into med school. Don't forget to like, comment and subscribe, and I want you to comment what strategies you've used to get letters of recommendation in the past. Until next time, always remember to dream without limits.