Alumni LOR: What's the best way to use it? Forum

[GarnerB]

Hey all,

I'm having an alumnus of a school in the T6 write me an LOR. The school, by the way, waitlisted me. I'm hoping this letter will have a non-zero impact on my chances of getting off the waitlist. As usual, the alumnus asked me to write a first draft. I was hoping the collective wisdom of TLS would guide me in the right direction.

Suggestions are greatly appreciated!

[KMart]

does this person know you well enough to write one on their own? it's generally frowned upon because you don't want your tone and rhetoric to flow through to the final submission. it looks very bad if the admissions people can tell you wrote it. i'd politely say it's not something your comfortable with and you're happy to talk with him and give him ideas on what to write about.

[cavalier1138]

How do you know the alumnus?

Schools are looking for letters from people who can actually speak to your personal qualities, not "impressive" names attached to the letters. Although I'm skeptical of the "non-zero" impact of an LOR on the waitlist.

[UVA2B]

How do you know the alumnus?

Schools are looking for letters from people who can actually speak to your personal qualities, not "impressive" names attached to the letters. Although I'm skeptical of the "non-zero" impact of an LOR on the waitlist.

Echoing this. If the person knows you well through professional or academic stuff, have at it. But having an alumnus write a LOR is unlikely to have any impact in getting you off the WL. Now if the LOR came with a serious financial contribution to the law school is a whole other thing...

[brinicolec]

Hey all,

I'm having an alumnus of a school in the T6 write me an LOR. The school, by the way, waitlisted me. I'm hoping this letter will have a non-zero impact on my chances of getting off the waitlist. As usual, the alumnus asked me to write a first draft. I was hoping the collective wisdom of TLS would guide me in the right direction.

Suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Regarding the bolded part: That's common??????? I've literally never been asked to do that.

Edit: Also agree with people's skepticism about the status of the recommender mattering/a LOR being enough to push you off of the WL.

[GarnerB]

does this person know you well enough to write one on their own? it's generally frowned upon because you don't want your tone and rhetoric to flow through to the final submission. it looks very bad if the admissions people can tell you wrote it. i'd politely say it's not something your comfortable with and you're happy to talk with him and give him ideas on what to write about.

Hey KMart, thanks for the suggestion! I'm not really in a position to ask them to write it on their own. They're doing me a huge favor by agreeing to write (sign off) on this LOR.

[foregetaboutdre]

Don't give your hopes up is pretty much all I'll add. I was a legacy at an ivy and rejected. I also knew a person who had 5/6+ direct family members go to a school, got WL, and their entire family of successful people wrote letters and it didn't help.

[GarnerB]

How do you know the alumnus?

Schools are looking for letters from people who can actually speak to your personal qualities, not "impressive" names attached to the letters. Although I'm skeptical of the "non-zero" impact of an LOR on the waitlist.

Hey Cavalier! This person knows me extremely well—almost as well as my own parents. I'm confident they'll speak glowingly to my personal qualities, as well as to my ability to succeed in the legal profession and in the law school I was waitlisted at in particular. I'd also love if you'd elaborate on the last sentence of your post. Are you skeptical of the LOR having any impact? Or, are you skeptical of the degree of impact it would have? If the latter, you could push your skepticism aside. I'm on board with anything that helps.

[rpupkin]

Does the alumnus donate a lot of money to the school? If so, the letter might have an impact. Otherwise, it almost surely won't.

Either way, it doesn't matter what the letter actually says.

[GarnerB]

But having an alumnus write a LOR is unlikely to have any impact in getting you off the WL. Now if the LOR came with a serious financial contribution to the law school is a whole other thing...

Wow. That's not good news

Why do you think an LOR is unlikely to have any impact? The alumnus, by the way, does contribute financially to the law school. I don't know how much, but likely not in the domain of "serious" financial contributions (where "serious" is in the seven and eight figure donation range).

[rpupkin]

But having an alumnus write a LOR is unlikely to have any impact in getting you off the WL. Now if the LOR came with a serious financial contribution to the law school is a whole other thing...

Wow. That's not good news

Why do you think an LOR is unlikely to have any impact? The alumnus, by the way, does contribute financially to the law school. I don't know how much, but likely not in the domain of "serious" financial contributions (where "serious" is in the seven and eight figure donation range).

First, the LOR is unlikely to have an impact because it's going to say the same sorts of things that are in the thousands of LORs that adcomms receive every year.

As for the financial contribution angle, you have a high standard for what counts as a "serious" contribution! Seven or eight figures!?!?!? An alumnus doesn't have to have donated hundreds of millions of dollars in order to be noticed. If your LOR writer is regularly involved with the school and donates a few thousand a year, that could help you.

[GarnerB]

Regarding the bolded part: That's common??????? I've literally never been asked to do that.

Edit: Also agree with people's skepticism about the status of the recommender mattering/a LOR being enough to push you off of the WL.

Be glad you've never had to write LORs for yourself They're among the most difficult things I've ever had to write.

Regarding your edit, I'd tend to agree with your assessment that an LOR, on its own, is not enough to guarantee admission off the waitlist. At this point, however, I'm just looking for anything that would give me at least SOME push.

[GarnerB]

Don't give your hopes up is pretty much all I'll add. I was a legacy at an ivy and rejected. I also knew a person who had 5/6+ direct family members go to a school, got WL, and their entire family of successful people wrote letters and it didn't help.

I'm so sorry to hear about that! Everyone tends to think their cycle is strange, but, looking at the data longitudinally, I'd definitely say ours is among the strangest cycles in recent memory. Also, regarding that person you know, I'm very curious to know where they stood in relation to the school's medians (e.g., were they below both medians)? I'd also love to know whether they wrote anything in addition to the LOR (i.e., LOCIs, emails to admissions staff, etc.)?

[GarnerB]

First, the LOR is unlikely to have an impact because it's going to say the same sorts of things that are in the thousands of LORs that adcomms receive every year.

As for the financial contribution angle, you have a high standard for what counts as a "serious" contribution! Seven or eight figures!?!?!? An alumnus doesn't have to have donated hundreds of millions of dollars in order to be noticed. If your LOR writer is regularly involved with the school and donates a few thousand a year, that could help you.

Hey rpupkin, you make very good points about LORs all sounding the same. There's only so much the admissions committee can glean from LORs when they all say the candidate is "amazing," "the best I've ever had," etc.

Also, regarding the second part of your comment, seven or eight figures excludes "hundreds of millions of dollars": X,XXX,XXX is seven figures, whereas XX,XXX,XXX is eight. Not trying to split hairs here, but I can't recall somebody donating the figure you referenced to a law school, whereas it's not uncommon to donate in the range I specified.

[ND2018]

The above said, I don't think that a LOR from an alumnus would hurt your chances. Further, it is not unusual for law students, and then alums after, to have relationships with adcomms. Several of my classmates babysit for adcomms and work in the admissions office part time. All this to say that I think that the right letter, from the right alum, could have a non-zero impact for a wait-listed candidate.

OP, have the alum send the letter to an adcomm, or anyone he/she knows works in the school administration. Obviously don't get your hopes up, but at this point, I don't see the harm in throwing the hail-mary.

[GarnerB]

For those of you who think an LOR would help, I'd love to know what y'all think I can do to maximize the effectiveness of my letter! There are tons of intelligent people here on TLS, so any bit of advice y'all could share would be deeply appreciated

And here's a little bit more by way of background info: (1) Recommender knows me extremely well. Lots of stories and anecdotes we could discuss. (2) Recommender is an authoritative voice in the legal world. They said they wanted to discuss my ability to succeed as a lawyer. (3) Recommender is very active with their alma mater. They're very well-positioned to advocate for me.

[GarnerB]

The above said, I don't think that a LOR from an alumnus would hurt your chances. Further, it is not unusual for law students, and then alums after, to have relationships with adcomms. Several of my classmates babysit for adcomms and work in the admissions office part time. All this to say that I think that the right letter, from the right alum, could have a non-zero impact for a wait-listed candidate.

OP, have the alum send the letter to an adcomm, or anyone he/she knows works in the school administration. Obviously don't get your hopes up, but at this point, I don't see the harm in throwing the hail-mary.

ND2018, thank you so much for your response!

Regarding the bolded part of your comment, this is definitely THE right alum. I couldn't have asked for a better letter-writer. What I'm trying to work out is the "right letter" aspect. If there any elements you'd care to mention or discuss, I'd be over-the-moon grateful! I feel like I'm lost at sea when it comes to this letter.

Also, would you recommend they address the letter (a) to the person(s) they know in the adcomm or (b) to the adcomm in general (or both)? This is the first time they're writing a letter, so I'd love to figure out the logistics to make life easier for my letter-writer.

[lymenheimer]

I'm confident they'll speak glowingly to my personal qualities, as well as to my ability to succeed in the legal profession and in the law school I was waitlisted at in particular.

How is this possible if you're writing your own letter?

[cavalier1138]

I'm confident they'll speak glowingly to my personal qualities, as well as to my ability to succeed in the legal profession and in the law school I was waitlisted at in particular.

How is this possible if you're writing your own letter?

Well, technically that makes it really easy for them to be sure about how glowing the letter's going to be.

[lymenheimer]

I'm confident they'll speak glowingly to my personal qualities, as well as to my ability to succeed in the legal profession and in the law school I was waitlisted at in particular.

How is this possible if you're writing your own letter?

Well, technically that makes it really easy for them to be sure about how glowing the letter's going to be.

"I'm positive they'll put their name to this paper that speaks glowingly about myself"

[rpupkin]

Also, regarding the second part of your comment, seven or eight figures excludes "hundreds of millions of dollars": X,XXX,XXX is seven figures, whereas XX,XXX,XXX is eight. Not trying to split hairs here, but I can't recall somebody donating the figure you referenced to a law school, whereas it's not uncommon to donate in the range I specified.

[UVA2B]

Decided to look at your post history, is the school in question UVA? If so, I double down on knowing who this alum is who is THE alum to write you a LOR, and why you didn't ask them initially. If you're rubbing elbows at cocktail parties with Janet Napolitano or Demaurice Smith, that would be good to know (there are countless other very influential alumni, just picked two at random off the top of my head).

All of this is devolving somewhat quickly. Your recommender asked you to write the initial draft of the LOR. Write something about yourself that would reflect how they could assess you and include as much personal as you can to give it maximum impact. Be fair, while being generous. And then give it to them to either revise or sign and submit. That's about all you can control at this point. If you get off the waitlist, congratulations, you're likely paying sticker. If not, you'll find out just how influential your LOR writer really is.

[GarnerB]

Decided to look at your post history, is the school in question UVA? If so, I double down on knowing who this alum is who is THE alum to write you a LOR, and why you didn't ask them initially. If you're rubbing elbows at cocktail parties with Janet Napolitano or Demaurice Smith, that would be good to know (there are countless other very influential alumni, just picked two at random off the top of my head).

All of this is devolving somewhat quickly. Your recommender asked you to write the initial draft of the LOR. Write something about yourself that would reflect how they could assess you and include as much personal as you can to give it maximum impact. Be fair, while being generous. And then give it to them to either revise or sign and submit. That's about all you can control at this point. If you get off the waitlist, congratulations, you're likely paying sticker. If not, you'll find out just how influential your LOR writer really is.

Hey UVA2B! Although UVA is an excellent school, I don't recall it being a T6 school. Of course, just because I can't recall something doesn't mean that it wasn't the case (I'm operating with incomplete information here).

Also, I'm really appreciating the responses! Calling this discussion "devolving" is a bit harsh. I love TLS' sense of humor, so I'm completely on board

[UVA2B]

Decided to look at your post history, is the school in question UVA? If so, I double down on knowing who this alum is who is THE alum to write you a LOR, and why you didn't ask them initially. If you're rubbing elbows at cocktail parties with Janet Napolitano or Demaurice Smith, that would be good to know (there are countless other very influential alumni, just picked two at random off the top of my head).

All of this is devolving somewhat quickly. Your recommender asked you to write the initial draft of the LOR. Write something about yourself that would reflect how they could assess you and include as much personal as you can to give it maximum impact. Be fair, while being generous. And then give it to them to either revise or sign and submit. That's about all you can control at this point. If you get off the waitlist, congratulations, you're likely paying sticker. If not, you'll find out just how influential your LOR writer really is.

Hey UVA2B! Although UVA is an excellent school, I don't recall it being a T6 school. Of course, just because I can't recall something doesn't mean that it wasn't the case (I'm operating with incomplete information here).

Also, I'm really appreciating the responses! Calling this discussion "devolving" is a bit harsh. I love TLS' sense of humor, so I'm completely on board

Fair, I missed the 'T6' on second read. Point still stands. And I hope you realize the time-honored tradition of soft rejections via the WL/reserve in the T6. You could be a KJD 163/3.6 and find your way onto a WL/reserve list. That doesn't mean you're getting in.

Just write the letter. Use your best 'T6' judgment in writing it well, and see what happens. It more than likely won't help.

[GarnerB]

Fair, I missed the 'T6' on second read. Point still stands. And I hope you realize the time-honored tradition of soft rejections via the WL/reserve in the T6. You could be a KJD 163/3.6 and find your way onto a WL/reserve list. That doesn't mean you're getting in.

Just write the letter. Use your best 'T6' judgment in writing it well, and see what happens. It more than likely won't help.

UVA2B, perhaps the most disappointing thing about this thread is all the debate over whether an LOR would help. I did not create this thread to debate whether an LOR would help. I created this thread for input on how best to use an alumni LOR. If you have nothing to contribute in this realm, please keep your feedback to yourself.

We established early on that an LOR would help. Why discuss the point further? I can't think of a time where the phrase "beating a dead horse" has been more apt than now. I also can't think of how much more explicit I could be in distinguishing between something helping and something guaranteeing admission off the waitlist.