Re: Letters of Recommendation - Problems

[Maurice Barnhill <mvb@UDEL.EDU>]

My father was a lawyer, and I asked him about refusing to write a
letter.  He said that the worst he could imagine happening is that the
student would go to court and get an order requiring me to write the
letter.  In which case I could write "Pursuing to the order of the court
of ... I am writing you a letter of recommendation for ...."  If the
recipient has any sense at all he doesn't bother to read the letter.

In fact, at Delaware we are required to refuse a letter if it will not
be favorable.  I have on one occasion had a student with an abysmal
record (who I thought might have some talent actually) who needed a
letter for me to have any chance to get into a program.  I told him that
what I could write would be very risky for him, gave him the letter, and
told him to mail it if he wished.  There is not much danger there.

I also once refused to write a letter for a premed student I had caught
cheating.  He complained to the Department Chair!  That went nowhere, of
course.

Leigh Palmer wrote:
> > I'm wondering what Leigh does when  dense student asks for the
> > recommendation and doesn't catch the hint?
>
> I tell him that I can't write him a letter that will help. I've not
> been pushed farther, but I suppose if I were to be I would tell the
> addressee that I was writing the letter at the student's request
> after I had informed him that it would not be a good recommendation.
> It is difficult to imagine that that could happen, and even more
> difficult to believe that I could expose myself to legal action if
> I did so. I know I do get paid to write these letters, but there is
> no requirement that the recommendations be laudatory; it is only
> necessary that they be honest.
>
> Leigh

--
Maurice Barnhill, mvb@udel.edu
http://www.physics.udel.edu/~barnhill/
Physics Dept., University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716