Tag: Undergraduate/Pre-med

Webinar: Using Interfolio’s Dossier for Letters of Recommendation | Highlights and Selected Q&A

Earlier this week, we hosted a free webinar and Q&A providing a glimpse into a Dossier Deliver user’s account —focusing on letters of recommendation—for scholars to get the most out of Interfolio’s free Dossier and Dossier Deliver.

We decided to include a demo-heavy portion in the webinar to address some common questions we were getting from users, and to share some of what we’ve learned about the folks using our products. We also touched on the newest features available, specifically how to utilize our quality check process. The webinar also features an exclusive Q&A session, leveraging our attendee’s questions as they participated in the webinar. 

Opening with some of the background and research underlying Dossier, the webinar covers several of the product’s common real-life applications and the best subscription for each of these lifecycle stages. It sheds light on best practices surrounding the three core areas of the Dossier account:

  • Materials
  • Letters
  • Deliveries

Alex Aponte of Interfolio’s Scholar Services team leads the audience through each of these account areas in a product demo of a Dossier Deliver account, diving deeply into many specific questions about confidential letters of recommendation. We know that requesting a letter of recommendation, or providing one, can be a delicate and sometimes stressful process when deadlines are involved, so we offer features and a support team to make those logistics simple.

Check out the full recording here, or read on below for the Q&A portion:

Here are a few of the most common questions we got during the webinar, and a quick recap of what our audience learned:

Q: Is there a way to store a confidential “generic” letter without sending it right away? I plan to apply for many positions, and I don’t want to make my letter writers send all the different letters one by one.

A: Yes! That is a very common use for Dossier, and you can do it for free. You can either request a general letter, or specify which opportunity the letter is for. Just use Dossier’s “General Request Recommendation” feature—look for the “Recommendation Type” section in the request form.

Q: When requesting a letter of recommendation through Interfolio, how should I use the due date feature? Can a letter writer still upload a recommendation letter after the due date has passed?

A: In Dossier, the due date feature is not technically binding—it is just a tool (attached to the request itself) for you to communicate to your letter writer the date by which they should submit their letter. If you set a due date, it will not prevent them from uploading their letter afterward. Also, if you set a due date, we will send your letter writer reminders 7 days and 1 day before the letter is due via email.

Q: What is the quality check feature and how is it helpful?

A: If you have a Dossier Deliver account, you will receive a guaranteed quality check on your letters of recommendation as they enter your account. There are a variety of things we look for and flag as inconsistent with what a user expects within their letter, such as:

  • We check for a signature.
  • We make sure there’s an official letterhead.
  • We ensure the file uploaded is in fact a letter.
  • We verify the letter bears both your name and the letter writer’s name.
  • We establish the letter is legible.

You can choose to send your letter even if it has errors–like a missing signature–so you retain control of your materials and deliveries.

Q: What type of deliveries are available through Dossier Deliver?

A: If you have a Dossier Deliver subscription, you can have your application materials (including letters, CVs, publications, images, and more) delivered to almost any destination via one of three methods:

  • You can provide us with an email address, and we’ll send your materials there, arranged in the order you specified.
  • You can provide us with a mailing address, and we’ll print out your materials and mail them, arranged in the order you specified, either First Class Mail or at an expedited service level.
  • If you’re applying somewhere that requires a confidential letter upload into their own online application system, we can substitute for your letter writers, and directly upload the letters stored in your Dossier. We only do this for letters, not other materials.

Finally, please note that anyone can use the free version of Dossier to apply to positions hosted entirely through Interfolio.

So, what can you do if you have questions about your Dossier account or creating one?

  • Watch the webinar. It’s about an hour long and includes a pretty comprehensive product demo.
  • Check out the FAQ section of our site for quick tips and tricks on how to navigate Dossier and Dossier Deliver.
  • Reach out to us. We’re people that thrive on serving our customers.

New features are here, including saving your letter writer as a contact

Today we launched several new Dossier product features in our ongoing quest to ensure our user’s time is spent on activities they choose, and so that we maintain our exclusive offering as a full-service Dossier (almost 20-years strong!).

In March, we introduced a valuable new feature to help prevent document quality issues from holding back your applications—for users with active Dossier Deliver subscriptions, we now perform a quality check on all confidential letters of recommendation.

And as of today, we have added several more features related to (1) how a Dossier user requests letters of recommendation and (2) how a letter writer receives such a request, further personalizing and streamlining the process.

As a Dossier user requesting a letter of recommendation I can:

  • Save my letter writers’ contact information
  • Attach multiple support files to my letter request via my Dossier account
  • Share my multimedia materials like video links and URLs within my request
  • Request multiple letters of recommendation at once
  • Auto-populate each letter writer’s name in bulk requests for professional appearance

To add a new contact while requesting a letter, click “Letters” in the left sidebar:

Click “Request a Letter”:

Start typing in “Recommender” box:

Click “Add New”:

And as a letter writer, when accessing supporting materials attached to a request for a letter of recommendation, now I can simply view them online within a convenient document viewer—or I can download them as always.

Click “View Documents” vs. “Download”:

Why do these changes matter to you?

First and foremost, it saves you time. It is far more convenient to simply select saved information than to type it in from scratch for every request. In addition, it helps to avoid errors in email addresses and names. We understand that receiving a stellar letter for a job application is the end goal, not requesting it.

Requesting and sending letters of recommendation is a stressful but necessary part of applying to many scholarly positions and other opportunities. Let Team Interfolio help you manage this portion of your to-do list, confidently.

Interfolio’s Dossier enables scholars to collect, curate, polish, and send out their materials at all stages throughout their academic professional path. Learn more about Dossier here.

Feature spotlight: guaranteed quality check on all letters

[This post was updated March 2022]

Interfolio has been providing a platform for requesting, storing, and sending confidential letters of recommendation since 1999. In the past 20 years, we’ve learned a lot about our worldwide user base, including what they expect from us and what we could add on to our service to improve their experience.

That’s why we want to highlight one of our main (and most popular) features: for users with active Dossier Deliver subscriptions, we perform a quality check on all confidential letters of recommendation as soon as they enter your account.  Literally, we have a team of humans that take a look at the document quality of your letter, and then notify you AND your letter writer of any issues. That’s part of what you get with your Deliver subscription: not just the cost of delivery, but a group of folks who are making sure that your materials aren’t going to hold you back from that opportunity because of a letter error.

There are a variety of things we look for and flag as inconsistent with what a user expects within their letter, such as:

  • We check for a signature.
  • We make sure there’s an official letterhead.
  • We ensure the file uploaded is in fact a letter.
  • We verify the letter bears both your name and the letter writer’s name.
  • We establish the letter is legible.

Why is this important to you?

From January through December 2021, we quality checked over 127,000 confidential letters of recommendation.  We are pros at spotting potentialy critical issues like a missing signature or misspelled name.

We will perform a thorough quality check promptly when a letter is received in your account, guaranteed.

This allows for:

  • More time to fix/address errors
  • Assistance from Team Interfolio in communicating errors to your/a letter writer
  • Reassurance and confidence when your letters are ready to deliver
  • Exposure to positive and negative quality check results

How do we tell you what’s wrong? (or right)

  • If you are a Dossier Deliver user, we will send you an email if we discover any gaps in document quality (such as when a signature or letterhead is missing, or if the document uploaded is not really a letter).
  • If you are a letter writer that has mistakenly submitted an incorrect letter or a letter with issues, we will send you an email.
  • When you are logged into your Dossier Deliver account, and a letter has received our quality check, you will be able to see a bulleted list of what is right and what is wrong (if there are issues) with your letter.
  • If you are a Dossier Deliver user and your letter is error-free, you will receive an email letting you know it’s good to go.

What are the nitty-gritty details?

  • If you are a Dossier Deliver user, we will quality-check letters for you within 4 business days of their arrival in your account. 
  • Interfolio DOES NOT restrict you from using letters still “pending” a quality check.
  • Letters are also checked before being submitted for delivery.
  • Every time you request new letters Interfolio checks those letters for quality.
  • We will provide assistance communicating errors to Letter Writers.
  • Interfolio customer service does not check the content of the letter and therefore are unable to provide feedback on if/how you should use your letter.

Requesting and sending letters of recommendation is a stressful but necessary part of applying to many scholarly positions and other opportunities. Let Team Interfolio help you manage this portion of your to-do list, confidently.

Interfolio’s Dossier enables scholars to collect, curate, polish and send out their materials at all stages throughout their academic professional path. Learn more about Dossier here.

Best practices: letters of recommendation for medical school

Interfolio has provided a platform for requesting, storing and sending letters of recommendation on behalf of pre-med, dental and other assorted undergrad studies since 1999. In the past 20+ years, we’ve learned a lot about our users, including what they expect from us and what we could add on to our service to make this process even simpler.

Below is a compiled list of best practices and informational resources related to the process of applying to medical school with a focus on letters of recommendation. Included are ways Interfolio’s Dossier Deliver subscription can be an irreplaceable component of the application process.

medical school letter of recommendation

When do I request my letters?

On average, we know it takes approximately 12 days from when a letter is requested to when it is uploaded by a letter writer into our system. This is of course a general timing guideline—if your letter writer is providing letters for more than just one student, this length of time can expand to multiple weeks or months. Identify who you want to write your letters by spring vacation (mid-March) and submit your requests to them all by the beginning of April. Per the Student Doctor Network, “This will give them at least 2 months to compose and submit your letters before your AMCAS submission.”

What goes into picking a letter writer?

Assume that your peers applying to med school also have high GPAs, MCAT scores and a thorough resume of extra-curricular and community-based activities. What sets you apart? Who you choose to provide a letter or support may make the difference between early admission or being chosen above other applicants. Do you have a professor, mentor, community leader or even someone in the medical field that can warmly vouch for you?

Based on an article on the Student Doctor Network, “Most medical schools will require at least 3 letters from professors of undergraduate classes: 2 science & 1 non-science.” Outside of letters related to courses you excelled in, it’s also a best practice to have letters related to extracurricular or community-based activities you were involved in. It’s best to shoot for 4-6 letters of rec that span all avenues of your work and personal achievements.

letters per account

How do I make the request?

At this point you have identified your 4-6 letter writers and now need to approach them with your request.

  • Assuming you know the person well and have a good relationship, ask them in person.
  • If you can’t ask them in person, send a well-outlined email including all the details of why you want them to write you a letter, what specific attributes you hope they include, as well as timing of when you need the letter.
  • Use Interfolio to request your letter.
    • Create your free Dossier account
    • Collect letters into your account by requesting recommendations
    • Your letter writer will receive an email from Interfolio asking them to submit your letter to your account
    • You will be notified once the letter has reached your account

How do I submit my confidential letters?

To keep a letter confidential and ensure it’s approved by AMCAS or another receiver, you should have your letters submitted one of 3 ways:

  1. Directly to your school
  2. Via AMCAS or a related health profession’s delivery service
  3. Interfolio’s Dossier Deliver

If your institution’s pre-medical advising office provides a letter of evaluation service, you may be able to arrange to have all of your letters transmitted to AMCAS through that office. If you choose to use Interfolio you will receive with your account subscription:

  • A lifelong place to request and store your letters
  • A quality control check on all letters as they are scheduled for delivery including:
    • Checking for a signature and official letterhead—so that you don’t risk the letter getting rejected by the schools where you’re applying.
    • Making sure the file uploaded is in fact a letter
    • Making sure the letter bears both your name and the letter writer’s name
    • Making sure the letter is legible
  • Guaranteed letter content confidentiality for your letter writer, and for you
  • A customer service team ready to field all your questions

Whatever avenue you choose to deliver your letters, be aware of timing for the rest of your application and other related deadlines.

Contact us

Resources

Interfolio’s Dossier enables scholars to collect, curate, polish and send out their materials at all stages throughout their academic professional path. Learn more about Dossier here.

Medical Career

Ask a candidate: how to get feedback and advice on your academic work

This post continues our series—begun last fall during faculty hiring “high season”—by a onetime academic job seeker, now academic-at-large, on good practices for academic career success.

When you’re on the academic job market, looking ahead to a professional review or applying for grants, it’s a great time to break your lingering undergrad habit of sweatily completing applications 15 minutes before midnight on deadline day. The reason? You should get feedback—from your dissertation advisor, the jobs coordinator in your department, a professor you’re friendly with, even a slightly-farther-along peer who’s been there and knows what it’s about. Your letters of recommendation, teaching statements, and project statements will improve accordingly. 

Here’s how to get the most out of getting feedback.

1. Pick the right person to comment.

The “right person” is going to vary depending on the job, placement, or funding opportunity that you’re shooting for, and your particular concerns about your application. 

  • If you’re fretting about your grasp of the subject matter at hand, ask someone who’s got it down—and let them know that’s why you’re asking.
  • If you’re most worried about your writing, ask somebody with good prose style—or, even better, a person with good prose style who you already know is great at commenting on other people’s writing.
  • If you’re lucky enough to have a connection with someone who has experience with the department or program you’re aiming for, ask them to use their institutional knowledge to assess whether your materials strike the right tone.

2. Leave plenty of time.

The person who’s willing to comment on your materials is doing you a solid. Reciprocate by making the experience as seamless as possible for them. That means finishing drafts of your documents with time to spare, and sending them along so that the commentator can fit reading them into his or her own schedule. Ask your commentator how much time they need, and set yourself a new deadline accordingly. And be sure to budget on the other end for your own turnaround time. You don’t want to give your commentator three weeks with a document, only to have them send it back on the eve of the deadline with revision suggestions that will require heavy lifting.

3. Provide context.

Your commentator needs to know what kind of promotion or funding opportunity you’re applying for, at the bare minimum. After she has agreed to read your materials and comment, and you’re ready to share your documents, include an email in which you send along the link to the desired role or opportunity. In brief (don’t rattle on), provide a bit of framing and summary to help them understand your approach. 

Include answers to questions like:

  • What do you think your chances of getting this job or grant might be, and why do you think you might be a good fit?
  • What are your concerns about the draft materials you have produced?
  • Are there any problem areas you want the person to address?

The more explicit you can be about the kind of feedback you’re seeking, the better. You don’t want a person you’ve asked for subject matter expertise to get hung up on comma placement. (They may not be able to help themselves! But by making it clear, in a gentle way, that you’re asking for a particular kind of feedback, you may make the experience easier on everyone.)

4. Be cool about the feedback when it comes.

It is only human to bristle when criticized. But try to remember, again: they are doing you a solid. In this context, there’s very little to be gained from defending yourself. Send an extremely polite reply email (or even a handwritten note!) thanking them effusively; if there are things you need clarified, ask, but make sure you truly don’t understand, and you’re not just being reactive. If you know it will take you a while to get over hurt feelings and get on with revisions, build that recovery space into your timeline.

With some preparation and the right mindset, getting feedback on the materials you’re using to present yourself when applying for jobs, fellowships, grants, future study (such as medical or graduate school) can help you sharpen your portfolio—while strengthening your relationships along the way.

One final rule: When somebody asks you for feedback in a couple years, say yes! Keep that karma flowing.

Interfolio’s Dossier enables scholars to collect, curate, polish and send out their materials at all stages throughout their academic professional path. Learn more about Dossier here.

Ask a candidate: how to request a recommendation letter without being annoying

This is one of a series of infrequent posts by a onetime faculty job seeker, now academic-at-large, on the job market.

You can procrastinate while writing seminar papers (coffee), putting together conference presentations (but don’t count on that plane wifi—take it from us), or completing group projects (just don’t ruin any friendships in the process). But try not to procrastinate when it comes to one grad school task: asking faculty members for recommendation letters. These are the relationships you can’t afford to mess up.

Ask for recommendation letters early

So, ask in a timely manner: as soon as you’ve decided to apply, or at least a month or two before the deadline. In your admirably early email, make sure to include a link to the description of the opportunity (job or fellowship or grant) you’re applying for. To that email, or in a follow-up sent well before the deadline, attach as many relevant documents as you can provide. The writer should see what kind of a case you’ll be making to your potential employers—or to funding bodies, in the case of grants and fellowships. You could show your recommenders drafts of a cover letter, project statement, or teaching statement, all of which would give them a sense of which qualities to emphasize in their own letters. (Some kind faculty members will also help you edit these drafts, if you produce them far enough ahead of time.)

Consider your writers

Ask the right people—the faculty members who know your work the most intimately. If you aren’t quite sure whether your target recommender knows you quite well enough, everything we just said about providing context counts double.

Also, supply the writer with as much information as you can: the year you took the seminar; the gist of your final paper; the subject of the in-class presentation you did. Don’t assume this borderline recommender will recall your brilliant seminar comments in a class you took two years ago, or the work you did for a departmental committee your first year in your program. If it’s appropriate, attach copies of the writing you did that the professor really liked, and follow up by describing how that work fit into projects you’ve done since the class concluded (“I took this research I did for your class and turned it into a journal article on Helen Hunt Jackson; here’s a copy of that article”). That’ll help the professor get a full picture of your evolution as a scholar.

Provide deadlines

If you’re asking a recommender you know well to write recommendation letters for a wide array of jobs during your faculty job search, create a spreadsheet for them to access, with all of the relevant information for each job: contact info, deadline, a link to the job ad. Arrange the rows in order of deadline.

Remind your letter writers

And now that your recommenders have all the information they need, with plenty of time to put it to use, don’t forget to remind them to write. You can ask them when they’d like to be nudged, or you can take matters into your own hands and send a reminder ten days or a week before the deadline arrives.

Keep in mind, some of your recommenders may be writing recommendation letters for you for years in a row, and will then become trusted colleagues in your home field. In this situation, a little professionalism goes a long way.

Interfolio’s Dossier enables scholars to collect, curate, and send their materials anywhere—including storing reusable recommendation letters, kept confidential from the requester—in application to faculty jobs and other academic opportunities. Learn more about Dossier here.

WEBINAR | Tips and Tricks for Using Interfolio’s Dossier | Highlights and Selected Q&A

Earlier this month, we hosted a free webinar and Q&A giving some tips and tricks—around recommendation letters, deliveries, and more—for academics to get the most out of Interfolio’s free Dossier and Dossier Deliver.

We decided to hold this webinar to answer some common questions we were getting from users, and to share some of what we’ve learned about the folks using our products. The webinar also features an exclusive Q&A session that draws upon our attendees’ submitted questions to ensure some of the most common questions are addressed. 

Opening with some of the background and research underlying Dossier from product director Erin Mayhood, the webinar covers several of the product’s common real-life applications. It sheds light on best practices surrounding the three core areas of the Dossier account:

  • Materials
  • Letters
  • Deliveries

Robin Price of Interfolio’s Scholar Services team leads the audience through each of these three Dossier account areas in turn and deftly outlines the ins and outs of the different sections—addressing many specific questions about confidential letters of recommendation. We know that requesting a letter of recommendation, or providing one, can be a delicate and sometimes stressful process when deadlines are involved, so we offer features and a support team to make those logistics simple.

Here are a few of the most common questions we got before and during the webinar, and a quick recap of what our audience learned:

Q: Is there a way to store a confidential “generic” letter without sending it right away? I plan to apply for many positions, and I don’t want to make my letter writers send all the different letters one by one.

A: Yes! That is a very common use for Dossier, and you can do it for free. You can either request a general letter, or specify which opportunity the letter is for. Just use Dossier’s standard “Request Recommendation” feature—look for the “Recommendation Type” section in the request form.

Q: When requesting a letter of recommendation through Interfolio, how should I use the due date feature? Can a letter writer still upload a recommendation letter after the due date has passed?

A: In Dossier, the due date feature is not technically binding—it is just a tool (attached to the request itself) for you to communicate to your letter writer the date by which they should submit their letter. If you set a due date, it will not prevent them from uploading their letter afterward.

Q: Can I delete everything stored in my Dossier? 

A: You can delete any materials stored in your Dossier that you’ve never sent anywhere. You cannot delete anything that you have included in an application or delivery—but you can move any document (whether previously sent or not) into your archive. Archiving a document removes it from your view, so that it doesn’t clutter up your account when you’re assembling new deliveries.

Q: What type of deliveries are available through Dossier Deliver?

A: If you have a Dossier Deliver subscription, you can get your application materials (including letters, CVs, publications, images, and more) delivered to almost any destination via one of three methods:

  • You can provide us with an email address, and we’ll send your materials there, arranged in the order you specified.
  • You can provide us with a mailing address, and we’ll print out your materials and mail them, arranged in the order you specified, either First Class Mail or at an expedited service level.
  • If you’re applying somewhere that requires a confidential letter upload into their own online application system, we can substitute for your letter writers, and directly upload the letters stored in your Dossier. We only do this for letters, not other materials.

Finally, please note that anyone can use the free version of Dossier to apply to positions hosted entirely through Interfolio.

So, what can you do if you have questions about your Dossier account or creating one?

  • Watch the webinar. It’s quick (only about 30 minutes) and covers a LOT of information.
  • Check out the FAQ section of our site for quick tips and tricks on how to navigate Dossier and Dossier Deliver.
  • Reach out to us. We’re people that thrive on serving our customers.