Many of you (those who are applying to medical/dental school
this year) have been checking in to find out if you are ready for a Spring
committee letter. I thought it might be useful to share with you the
committee letter writing process.
Students at Hunter are lucky in that they have a Committee
letter that helps enhance their applications to health professions schools. Many
schools do not offer such a service to their students! The faculty who
write these letters on your behalf must do so without really knowing you as a
student or as a person. You are assigned to a faculty member who will
meet with you for 45 minutes to an hour. Based on that meeting, and on
the contents of your file, this person must sit down and compose a letter that
will highlight your accomplishments, smooth over any rough patches you might
have as an applicant (a semester of bad grades, a C in organic, etc), as well
as present a compelling argument that you are who you portray yourself as in
your application. Thus it is imperative that this faculty member, who has
only met you once, to have as many supporting comments about your ability as a
student and person as possible from other sources. Some of these sources
can come from your volunteer letter, from your employment letter, from your
research letter. However, the most important piece will come from faculty
who have had you in class over the course of a semester or two. These
comments, from lecturers and lab and recitation instructors, are the “meat
and potatoes” of your letter and there is no good substitute for their
comments. Many of you have complained of faculty and lab instructors who
have not handed in evaluations and you seem upset that we make YOU responsible
for getting them to complete them. This is not done to be punitive; this
is done so that we are sure that the letter being sent on your behalf is as
strong and comprehensive and supportive of your efforts as possible. We
are not penalizing you for not having evaluations; we are forcing you to pursue
these comments with the same vigor and zeal you display in studying for these
classes. Not having one or two evaluations is ok. It is not ok,
however, if you are an “A” student and you only have five or six
evaluations in your file. The fewer evaluations, the fewer comments, the
weaker your letter! We appreciate that this is not in your control but we
must insist that you make collecting these evaluations a priority so that your
letter is the best it can be. If you are struggling to get science
evaluations then begin to collect evaluations from non-science faculty as well.
These cannot wholly substitute for science evaluations but they do add
some “meat”. This way we will have plenty of comments that
can verify the impression of the faculty person who will write your Committee
letter.
Last, our deadline of March 1st is again not to
be punitive. As of March 3rd we will begin making assignments
for the Spring committee letter. We will assign students until we run out
of faculty. Once all faculty have been assigned we will rollover any
students left into the Fall for committee letter assignment. So if you
cannot complete your file by March 1st you can certainly HOPE that
we will have faculty left for an assignment later in the month. But
students are assigned on a first come, first served basis. And the
assignments cannot be made unless your file is COMPLETE. To ensure your
spot you should certainly do those things that are well within your control:
make sure your resume, all transcripts, and the premed packet are in your file
by the 1st. Make sure your dean of students report is on the way by
the 1st. Be sure you have enough courses done to qualify for a
Committee letter (six lectures and labs for postbaccs, at least 50 credits done
here at Hunter for undergrads and a science
GPA for everyone of at least 3.3). I have included here the online evaluation
link for faculty to use if they wish. http://webforms.hunter.cuny.edu/premed/
. If you are not sure of your science GPA go to the registrar’s GPA
calculator to tabulate all your biology, chemistry, physics and math grades
from ALL schools attended in the US by using the following link: http://registrar.hunter.cuny.edu/subpages/gpacalculator.shtml
Sorry for the length but I thought it would help you to see
how the process works so that you might be a tad bit more pro-active in going
after these evaluations!
Office hours for spring 2008
M-Th 10AM-12PM, Wed and Thurs 2-3PM, Tues 2-4PM
L.Wood-Hill
Director, Prehealth Professions Programs
Hunter College of CUNY
695 Park Ave, E812
NY, NY 10021
212-772-5244
FAX: 212-772-5138
http://studentservices.hunter.cuny.edu/prehealth.htm