Applying to medical school can seem like a solitary effort. The work is all on you.
You’ve got to get great grades, do well on the MCAT, earn enough clinical hours, and write a stellar set of personal statements and secondary essays. Understandably, there’s one application task that you might be excited to leave to someone else: the writing of your recommendations.
You reach out to the people who can speak best to your strengths, picking the right mix of science and non-science mentors or bosses, and drawing on multiple phases of your life experience, from university to professional environments, classrooms to gap year.
But now one of your writers tells you they’re extremely busy and need you to write your own letter of recommendation. What do you do? How do you write a medical school letter of recommendation for yourself?
This isn’t an uncommon situation, though it can make many applicants uncomfortable or scared. What can you say about yourself that won’t sound pompous, braggy, or awkward? Won’t it be obvious that you’ve written it, instead of a recommender? How can you handle this with respect for your recommender’s time and for the application process, while also avoiding short-changing yourself?
First of all, know that writing your own letter of recommendation is an acceptable, even common practice, and that it doesn’t mean your recommender is too busy to help you get into medical school or uninterested in championing you. They said yes, which means they’re on board!
Approach this situation as a chance to prepare your recommender to write the ideal rec letter. By maintaining an open conversation, the result may be better than what would have come had your recommender been sitting alone in a room, scratching their head about what to say about you.
Here’s how to ensure that this self-written letter maximizes your chances of getting into medical school.
Begin by establishing what your recommender wants, and, if possible, why they want it. Do they really need you to write the whole letter from scratch? Could you simply offer them an outline or a list of bullet points to cover? Here’s one way to ask these questions via email:
Dear Professor Torres,
Thank you so much for agreeing to work on my letter. I’m happy to get you whatever materials you need to make the recommendation strong. What would be easiest for you to work with? Do you prefer a full draft, an outline or list of bullet points, or something else?
If you have no preference, I can write up a draft leaving space for you to add some information that only you could articulate about me.
Please let me know if that works, and thank you so much again. I’m grateful to have your support as I apply to medical school.
Best wishes,
If asking during an in-person conversation, try something like: “Thanks so much, Professor Torres. I’m really grateful for your help. I’d just like to write down what exactly you need from me to make this letter happen. What makes the most sense? A full draft? An outline? Bullet points? Something else?”
Then politely try to establish why your recommender wants you to be involved in the drafting of the letter. It may be because they’re simply pressed for time, but it may also be because there are things about you—characteristics or accomplishments—that they feel they don’t know. You can then ensure that you cover that material in either bullet points, an outline, or a prose draft.
Lastly, confirm that no matter what you do, your recommender will go through your initial draft or letter. Even if you’re playing a major role in writing your letter, your recommender should still be involved, both for ethical reasons and because the entire point of a recommendation is to get someone more experienced than you to say you’re a good candidate for a medical career. If they really don’t seem to plan on contributing to the draft at all, you may be better off asking someone else who’s more passionate about your potential.
As you get to writing, draw on some of the same tools you used to sculpt a strong medical school personal statement. Your recommendation letter should address your personal characteristics and qualities, and it should provide examples and anecdotes of times that you demonstrated said qualities. While your personal statement is a chance for you to reflect on those, your letter of recommendation should include examples of your recommender seeing these qualities in action, whether in the classroom, the office, or the lab.
For instance, it’s not useful for Professor Torres to write that Karina is smart, hardworking, and responsible if she doesn’t also note instances where she saw Karina display her smarts (say, by acing her class), her work ethic (by persisting in the face of less-than-ideal lab results), or her responsibility (by leading group projects with less invested students).
Here are a few steps to help you connect the good work you’ve already done on your medical school personal statement to the letter you need:
Include information that will be helpful to admissions committees. We suggest reading the AAMC’s letter of recommendation guidelines in order to identify additional information that admissions committees find useful to include. For instance, the AAMC suggests noting how applicants have demonstrated specific “core, entry-level competencies.” You don’t need to cover every competency in your letter, and you shouldn’t insert them in ways that feel forced. However, by familiarizing yourself with these competencies and with the information that adcoms are generally looking for, you’ll then be able to work them into your letter in appropriate, natural ways.
Use a standard recommendation letter format. Your letter should be about one page single or 1.5 spaced, and no more than five paragraphs. Remember: a longer recommendation letter is NOT necessarily a better recommendation. As with any formal communication, stick to Times New Roman, 12-point font, with 1-inch margins, and ensure that your advisor uses official letterhead, if possible.
You may find it helpful to create an outline before writing your first draft. Here’s a letter of recommendation outline one student, Toni, used to organize her writing:
Here’s a medical school letter of recommendation example based on Toni’s draft that you can use as a template:
Jillian Ostrowski, MD, PhD
Professor of Neurobiology and Medicine, University of California - Beverly Hills
1 Phineas Gage Way
Anderson, CA 12345
jillian.ostrowski@ucbh.edu
Letter for Toni Zhao
AAMC number 98765432
Dear Admissions Committee Members,
I first met Toni Zhao when she was a sophomore in my Introduction to Neurobiology course. This is one of the large lecture classes on campus, but Toni came to office hours regularly to discuss the weekly topic and to get advice about pursuing a career in medicine and neuroscience. The next semester, I took her on as a junior TA due to her straight As in the class, and she began grading tests and papers and assisting with study sections.
I worked further with Toni when she was a junior and applied to be in a course I co-teach with the divinity school. This is a class generally populated by graduate students, half of whom are in medical school and the other half of whom are training for the clergy. We focus on degenerative brain diseases. Students learn the hard science of what causes various forms of dementia and then spend time in pastoral care communities caring for patients.
Toni, who is the stepdaughter of a pastor and the daughter of a physician, petitioned me to join the class, and, after consulting with my co-instructor, I decided she was both academically and emotionally mature enough to participate. This is the only time I admitted an undergraduate student to the course.
Toni thrived in this unique environment, not only acing the academics but also developing a relationship with a particular patient, Georgina, who was prone to intense anxiety as her memory failed her. I was impressed to see someone as young as Toni successfully teach Georgina mindfulness techniques that allowed her to better contain her panic attacks. A few months later, when Georgina passed away, her family invited Toni to the funeral—a sign of the connection she had established in a very short period of time. Toni was herself deeply affected by the relationship and the course, and wrote movingly about it for the UCBH Medical Humanities Review.
In my thirty years of teaching, I’ve never met a student who so exemplifies both the combination of facility in the sciences and the emotional intelligence that will be required in medical school and as a physician. I wholeheartedly recommend Toni for admission.
Lastly, make clear to your recommender what’s left for them to do. Refer back to the original expectations set when you asked them what they needed from you (i.e., bullet points or a full draft). When you send over your draft, write clearly what else they should do.
Here’s an example follow-up email from Karina:
Dear Professor Torres,
Thank you so much for being willing to recommend me for medical school. As we discussed last week, I’m attaching a draft of a letter of recommendation for you to look over and adjust as you see fit..
I’ve written up a few examples of my interest in global medicine and public health, including papers I wrote for your class and work I did to prepare for the medical mission trip we went on. I’ve left space for you to add a paragraph that places me in the context of other students you’ve worked with, since that’s something I can’t speak to myself.
I would be more than happy to work on this letter further or provide any additional information that would be helpful to you—please let me know! Thank you so much for your support during this process.
How do you know what you can’t write about but your recommender can? Think: context, uniqueness, and superlatives.
Both Toni and Karina were aware that recommenders need to not only speak to specific good qualities an applicant has exemplified but also need to place them in the larger context of the applicant pool. A professor may have worked with many medical school hopefuls over the years and should be able to say something like, “Toni is one of the most diligent students I worked with this year. In addition to doing her own lab work along with the two other undergraduates in my lab, she was the only one to offer to mentor next year’s students.”
You’ll want your letter writer to be able to say that you were the only or the most or the best in something—something that you’ve already drafted up for them.
In this case, Professor Ostrowski might note that Toni is the only undergraduate student she’s ever let into this advanced graduate school class. Toni’s original draft might read: “I worked further with Toni when she was a junior and applied to be in a course I co-teach with the divinity school.” After Toni asks Professor Ostrowski to include a note about being the only undergrad to ever be admitted to the course, Professor Ostrowski might add: “This is the only time I admitted an undergraduate student to the course.”
Writing your own medical school letter of recommendation may initially seem intimidating or awkward, but it’s actually a chance to get the rec letter of your dreams. Keep the line of communication open with your recommender while taking the opportunity to establish what traits, accomplishments, and anecdotes you want presented to medical school admissions committees. By approaching the letter writing process as a collaborative effort between you and your recommender, your applications will be all the better for it.
Dr. Shirag Shemmassian is the Founder of Shemmassian Academic Consulting and one of the world's foremost experts on medical school admissions. For nearly 20 years, he and his team have helped thousands of students get into medical school using his exclusive approach.
