Reference Guide for Letters of Recommendation
Electronic Document and Submission Criteria
- Please provide a letter in PDF (Adobe Portable Document Format) format whenever possible.
- If you are unable to convert your document into a PDF, a ".doc" Word document is acceptable. These are indicated as “Word 97-2003 Document” when saving files in Microsoft Word.
- Files in the ".docx" format (the default file type in recent versions of Microsoft Word) and the .wps format (the default file type for Microsoft Works) are not accepted by our system.
- Submissions should be limited to a single document file. If your recommendation is comprised of multiple documents, please combine them into one document file.
- There is a document file size limit of 20MB.
- On the upload form, please use the buttons instead of using your Enter key.
The Reference Process
Graduate applicants are asked to provide the email addresses of references after they submit their application.
Upon indication of a reference’s email address, an email is sent to the reference as shown in the sample image below. Applicants may add additional text to the standard message to suit their needs.
The link provided in the email will bring up a document upload page for the submission of letters of recommendation.
References are asked to provide their name, email address, and phone number. They may also include an additional comment.
Pressing the Browse button will bring up a window where the reference browses for the file on his or her computer, selects it, then presses the Open button.
With the reference information provided and the document file indicated, the reference presses the submit button at the bottom of the page to submit the letter of recommendation for the applicant.
A confirmation is then provided.
This serves as the only confirmation of submission of the letter of recommendation.
At this point, an applicant is able to view within their application status page that this reference has submitted their letter of recommendation.
Errors and Help
The link provided in the reference request email does expire after some time (typically 60 days). An expired link will bring up an error page which indicates that the link has expired. In these cases, references will need to ask that the applicant re-generates a reference request from their application requirement checklist.
If another error is presented, the error page will provide possible reasons for the resulting error.
Additionally, references may access the HELP link at the top right of the document upload form or error page for additional assistance.
