Recommendation Letter trouble

TrueAce
Fri, 30 Dec 2011 14:28:19 +0000

Hello all-

I need some advice on a situation.

I’m applying to Masters in Applied Stats programs at a handful of schools.

Trouble is, I’m having some issues with gathering my letter of recommendations here (I have a deadline January 20th and most others are February 1st and beyond).

Thing is, I majored in Political Science and Psychology. Although I’m really good at math and took a ton of math courses in high school (BC Calc, Multivariable Calc, Diff EQ) – and stats courses in my majors, the trouble is finding professors that A. know me well and B. I’ve done stats projects for — has become increasingly difficult.

I ended up asking a Russian prof and Advertising prof to write me letters (and they are almost finished) because they know me very well. The third prof was going to be the most relevant as I did a major stats project for her for political science. Problem is, I emailed her two weeks ago, and again a couple days ago, and I have never got a reply back. I know profs are on vacation this time of year, but the other two replied, so I don’t know.

Thing is, she was my most relevant prof, and with the other two profs being wildly outside the pail of stats, I’m a bit nervous now.

Assuming this prof doesn’t respond until it’s too late, or never does, what are my options here?

The only other profs I’m looking at is either

A). A civil war professor that knows and likes me well. But this would only add to the comedy of my recommendations, would it not?

B). A grad student instructor for a psychology course where I completed a major statistics project. Trouble is, it was junior year, about 3 years ago, and I’m not sure this instructor would remember me or not, like at all. I still have the project and can show it to her, but … it’s iffy, you know? There’s a good chance she wouldn’t remember me remotely, outside of the 30 page stats research project I send her, and maybe a few scripted things/ my thoughts about who and what I did in class I would send her.

So what do I do here? What are my best options?

Do I ask the grad student instructor or Civil war professor to submit the rec letter for all of my schools?

Do I tell one of them to submit a rec letter for the January 20th school, and wait a bit longer (I think my old Poli Sci prof gets back to school Jan 16th) — for my Poli Sci prof to potentially submit a letter for the remaining schools with deadlines in early February and later?

Another fun fact. My old Poli Sci prof MOVED to another university after I graduated. Not sure if that matters or not. I ended up asking the department secretary of that school about a good way of contacting her (well, I already have her new email address and tried emailing her twice), but have heard nothing back from her either (I guess everyone is still on vacation).

I just need some help here… I’m stressing big time.