Letter of Recommendation for PhD Students

Shivani Bhatt, 19 Nov 2016

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A letter of recommendation for PhD aspirants is an important part of the admission documents. While other admission documents like transcripts and scores are factual, LOR is an independent human perspective of the applicant which connects the facts and plans of a resume and statement of purpose. A resume is a list of your accomplishments, transcripts are a proof of accomplishments whreas an SOP outlines the importance and your preparedness for the course. A letter of recommendation for PhD is an independent view on all of the above.

PhD application usually requires at least two recommendation letters. This gives the admission committee an opportunity to know the applicants as a people with skills which would otherwise be difficult to know from their resume, transcripts and SOP.

PhD Letter of Recommendation should mention at least three qualities of the applicant – a social quality and at least two technical or subject related qualities. Moreover, as PhD is an advanced specialised programme, the subject related quality should be focused on projects carried out and specialized courses done which will aid his/her PhD research.

Letter of Recommendation for PhD Students: The need

Recommendation Letters for PhD applicants hold much more importance than for undergraduate or Masters applicants. Grades and GRE scores play a big role in receiving an admit from a university. A Letter of Recommendation (LOR) is usually the deciding factor when choosing between candidates with similar credentials.

Letter of Recommendation for PhD Students: The right person

Before asking someone for a Letter of Recommendation, you should know whom to ask. PhD is purely academic degree and therefore you need to have referees who can vouch your academic inclination and strengths. Referees should be academicians with whom you have worked or someone who has supervised or taught you. Applicants aspiring for a PhD programme should ideally ask their Masters project guide to be one of the referees. Other recommendations should be the teachers and professionals who are from the field or specialization in which you intend to do your PhD.

Friends and relatives are not supposed to write your Letter of Recommendation for PhD for a number of reasons; First, they do not have the first-hand information of the applicant's academic capabilities. Second, as they have not professionally or academically worked with the applicant and their peers, they would not be able to present comparative information of the student. Also, the recommender might not have an in-depth knowledge of the discipline the applicant intends to do a PhD from.

Last but not the least, relatives cannot be objective about the applicant's qualities.

An ideal referee to write Letter of Recommendation for PhD would be a professional who has known the applicant academically for no less than one year. The recommender should not only know you as one of the students at the department, they should know you as a person, your capabilities as a student, as well as your control over the subject they have been teaching. They should also be aware of your future plans.

Academic recommendations can be taken from teachers, supervisors, guides, internship/project supervisors etc.

Letter of Recommendation for PhD Students: Qualities to focus on

PhD recommendations are very subject specific. Referees should speak of strong subject knowledge as well as analysis traits. Letters of Recommendation should show the student as possessing positive qualities like intelligence, self-motivation, responsibility, and amicableness. Emphasis should be given on passion and dedication as well. Advanced study like PhD is often a challenging and demanding program. Therefore, the applicants should also display perseverance, competitiveness and ability to work independently. Courses and knowledge related to PhD programme related packages, extra courses, statistical analysis techniques should be exemplified in the Letter of Recommendation.

Letter of Recommendation for PhD Students: Parts of an LOR

A Recommendation Letter for PhD will typically be between one to two pages. The document should be well differentiated into 5–6 paragraphs. The LOR should begin with an introductory paragraph about the recommender and his/her association with the applicant.

The next 3–4 paragraphs should outline the different academic and social qualities of the applicant with suitable substantiation. No quality should be mentioned without a suitable example.

Finally, the concluding paragraph would be summing up the above with a line recommending the applicant to the programme.

Elements of Letter of Recommendation for PhD

Element	Content
Addressee	Dear Admission Committee,
About the reviewer association with the applicant.	It is a pleasure to recommend Ms Tenzin Pema for a PhD programme in Psychiatry at [University Name]. I have known Ms. Tenzin for the past two years through her work in my Project titled, ‘Learned Helplessness and Achievements in Adolescent Males and Females’. Pema has completed her Masters and MPhil in Adolescent Psychology from [University Name]. She first approached me two years ago about the possibility of work in my project as a Research Fellow. We had discussed the scope of the project and her job responsibilities in our first meeting.
Quality 1 Subject knowledge	She had asked good questions and also referred a few Learned Helplessness studies that have been carried out by the students in the Department as their Masters and M. Phil Project. I was impressed by her preparedness for the interview and her inquisitiveness to know more on the subject. On appointment, I often found her in the library looking for other similar studies done. She often discussed her findings with me as well as discuss the course of action and possible evaluation techniques for the project. After a long secondary research, we decided on evaluating our subjects on NEO-Five Factor Inventory (FFI) before the actual experiment. This study examined the psychometric properties of the Children's Attributional Style Questionnaire (CASQ), the 48-item questionnaire designed to assess children's causal explanations for positive and negative events
Quality 2. Leadership skill	During that project, Pema demonstrated the ability to work independently with creativity and enthusiasm as well as effectively lead a team of 3 Project Fellows for sample selection and data collection techniques. She trained the team on all aspects of NEO-Five Factor Inventory (FFI) as well as CASQ. She was also able to collect the CASQ data of more than 50% of the students a year later.
Quality 3. Social and Communication Skill and Analysis skills	Her communication skills put both the subject as well as the interviewer at ease thus facilitating an unbiased and effective data collection. Pema has good clarity on the various data analysis statistical packages especially MATLAB and ANOVA which immensely helped us in doing a comparative study through various methods. She was quick to learn R and use it effectively for analysis. She would be invariably the first person be at the school well prepared for the day.
Quality 4. Team skills	The Project Fellows in the project always had praises for Pema. They always mentioned her patience and perseverance in clarifying their doubts on the standardized data collection and analysis techniques. Pema had doubled her efforts on data collection when she found that one of the project fellows was down with fever and cold. She had not let this effect the Project Schedule.
Quality 5. Creativity and patience	Pema is very creative and patient with the kids. The long questionnaire would be too tedious for the kids so she would often make origami for them as they worked on the questionnaire.
Quality 6. Achiever	Her hard work and perseverance paid off when her paper, ‘Learned helplessness and achievements in pre-adolescent males and females’ was selected for publication in an International Journal.
Strong Recommendation	Ms Tenzin Pema is clearly the best student that I have worked with in the past few years. I strongly recommend her for a PhD programme from [University Name]. She would be an asset to any university she joins.
Referee information	ABC DEF Professor Department of Social Psychology University Name City Email ID: Contact No:

A Letter of Recommendation for PhD students gives a human touch to the applicant’s profile. It is the only document which can present the applicant’s social side to the admission committee. Therefore, choose a referee who can not only substantiate your academic strengths but also cite appropriate examples of your social qualities in your recommendation letter for PhD.