I just finished the third year of my undergraduate degree. I am planning on applying to law school next year, and am somewhat concerned about asking my professors for reference letters in September. I was advised to approach professors who gave me an “A” in their class.

Considering I found out which classes I got an “A” in after the school year ended, I was wondering if it would be at all appropriate to e-mail a couple of professors now, rather than waiting until September. I’ve heard that most professors will only write one or two letters each year and I do not want to miss my opportunity by asking too late.

If you can provide me with some advice in regards to this situation, I would greatly appreciate it.

Thank-you,

Andria

It is also a good idea to actively foster a relationship with professors you would consider asking for letters of support by attending their office hours and discussing your research questions and plans with them It doesn’t need to take alot of time, and most profs are delighted to speak with serious students.

Your profs can also be excellent sources of information about good schools in your field and may even be able to provide introductions to colleagues at prospective schools for you to contact and beging ‘conversing’ with online prior to submitting an application. This will increase your chances of finding a program that is a good fit for your research interests. It can also increase your chances of getting into a program if you can show that you have shared research interests with their faculty.

If you are serious about applying to a PhD program, it is very important that you make the time to develop relationships with faculty – make it a priority!

Hello! I am a student in my second year of master degree. I’d like to ask about who to be invited as referee.

As my master degree is a part-time one, most of us only get evening classes once or twice a week. We have different professors for different courses, and some courses even get two professors to share the whole course. As a result, the time of interaction between professors and individual student is very limited. And some classes are very large comprising of more than 50 students, so the professors may not even have chance to recognize any individual student.

So, I’d very much like to ask, in such a case, it is very difficult for me to find a suitable referee to invite. Then, what shall I do?

Thank you for your kind attention.

This point was raised in a recent article in The Chronicle http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Recommendation-Letters/20860/?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

Your idea of the impact the opinions of referees has and at what point they should be introduced into the process is an interesting one. I can see how it might streamline the process for committees, but would it be as beneficial for the applicants I wonder.

Also, a bigger issue for many is how to get reference letters at all. Some faculty will get 5-10 requests for letters from students applying for the same job. I know some faculty who have a policy of writing 2 letters max for any given job. This usually means they will only write letters for their own supervised PhD students and everyone else is SOL. On the other hand, other faculty will write an unlimited number of letters, which can have the effect of watering down the value for all.

I would like to see universities adopt a more standardized and fair way of getting references – one that reflects the reality that many jobs receive well over a hundred applicants, all of whom have to get letters from the same small cadre of faculty. I think it’d be better if contacts for three references would have to be listed on your CV – these would only by contacted after a shortlist has been created.