Damaging someone's reputation or character

[naisho]

In your case for work, school, gym, etc or some other type of network, would you write badly of someone expecting you to put in a good word to someone else?

Recently browsing on metafilter and came across this.
It brought a really good argument, it was about a professor who agreed to write a letter of recommendation for a prospective grad student and ended up writing really terrible stuff.

What do you think of the situation?
How do you handle a poor recommendation from a professor you still have to take classes from? - recommendation Education negative | Ask MetaFilter

How do you handle a poor recommendation from a professor you still have to take classes from?

Asking for My SO: My SO is applying for graduate programs and sought the recommendation of a professor that she had taken three classes from. For the first class she received a C, the second a B and the third a B+. While these were not the most stellar grades, however; the course was challenging and she worked hard to earn the grades she did. She often sought out the professor during office hours, took on additional academic work to improve and generally put in extra hours to achieve the higher grade in the second and third class.

She thought the professor would make a good recommendation because she had not only shown improvement in a subject that was challenging for her; she worked closely with the professor during office hours and the instructor understood her struggle.

Last month she was applying for a graduate programs and asked for the recommendation, it was to be sealed and delivered from my SO to the programs she was applying to. Fast forward to now. Through a non related twist of events my SO is now holding off on applying for grad schools for a year. The dated recommendations that she had received were no longer going to work and she will have to seek out new ones when she does apply.

Tempting fate she decided to open the recommendation (all the other recommendations had been left unsealed for her to read before submission.).

Turns out the recommendation was awful, not just poorly written and addressed to the wrong schools, but actually recommending that they do not accept her. The letter was full of thinly veiled insults and went as far as to list the lowest scores for all assignments completed during her course. It was more then what I would say in polite company.

Apart from being generally upset about receiving a dress down from a tenured faculty member, the letter would have sunk her applications; applications that would have cost thousands of dollars and countless hours. Not to mention being unable to attend the universities. I also have concern that she might be doing the same thing to other students. My SO narrowly missed the stream of rejection letters that would have come from this; I can’t help but wonder if someone else didn’t.

While I respect the professor’s opinion (I think she was wrong) I see no need for her to do this. She could have just turned the request down. I can think of a myriad of options that would have been much nicer, and would have saved my SO huge amounts of time and money. Even if her recommendation is that my SO does not attend grad school the professor could have said “I do not think you are ready for grad school” rather than letting her believe she was getting a positive recommendation.

Here is the real dilemma; she still has one class left that must be taken with her professor. She is now (rightly) dreading class and has a distinct feeling like the professor is “out to get her” I am inclined to believe her.

So the TL;DR: What to do when a professor (at a California school) writes a sealed extremely negative recommendation and you have to take a class with them. Was the professors letter within reason, or was she acting out of line, and how would you handle it?

posted by anonymous to education (39 answers total) 9 users marked this as a favorite

 

[Jiro]

this kind of thing is old news. due to legal reason, employer will not write negative LOC. it's simply best to write mediocre LOC than negative LOC.

 

[Jiro]

Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral - Graziadio Business Review | Graziadio Business Review | Graziadio School of Business and Management | Pepperdine University

 

[naisho]

So in the USA there is something against "legally" writing bad stuff about someone else who may have worked or etc under someone?

You mentioned it, but I never knew there was something written in law or legal about it.

 

[naisho]

Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral - Graziadio Business Review | Graziadio Business Review | Graziadio School of Business and Management | Pepperdine University

This link is very interesting, it says before the 1990s this type of lawsuit over this behavior never existed in the professional world. Very intriguing, times are changing a lot.

 

[naisho]

I also imagine a lot of deaf people can or may face this situation if a previous employer or professor talks very badly of them.

Can picture stuff like them writing because John is deaf, I had to grade easy on him, or "I let John go on some mistakes he made at work because being deaf, he wasn't able to do this" and gives a bad reference to the new employer.

That's messed up.

 

[Jiro]

So in the USA there is something against "legally" writing bad stuff about someone else who may have worked or etc under someone?

You mentioned it, but I never knew there was something written in law or legal about it.

you already know about "Defamation Lawsuit" or "Libel". It's just that recently it extends to LOC.

 

[TWA]

I never had a professor write a letter for me which they did not allow me to view (consequently, they were glowing letters of rec.), but even if a professor did request that I did not look at it, I still would. IMO, the person has EVERY RIGHT to see what is being said about them and to decide to withhold any letter that does not work to their advantage.

I was asked to write a letter of rec for a writing student who wanted to pursue graduate school in fiction writing. It was a dilemma for me because while the guy was a very talented writer, he was a lousy, uncommitted student. I wrote an honest letter speaking to the strengths of the student, but also warning that he had a tendency to not work hard. I did give the student the benefit of the doubt and framed the letter in such a way that it was a matter of him not being challenged enough and that he could perhaps improve his work ethic in the right environment.

One problem that professors often face is that they are asked to write letters for students whom SHOULD NOT be in graduate school (to address the OP, any student who regularly earns Cs and Bs should not be applying to grad school), and the professor knows it. What to do? Some academics do see it as a moral duty to keep mediocrity and unfit students out of the post-baccalaureate academy, but the fact is, these students will find their way in eventually. A professor who really feels that a student should not apply to graduate school should have a personal conference with that student and discuss this with them, as opposed to writing a damning letter of recommendation.

 

[Jiro]

I also imagine a lot of deaf people can or may face this situation if a previous employer or professor talks very badly of them.

Can picture stuff like them writing because John is deaf, I had to grade easy on him, or "I let John go on some mistakes he made at work because being deaf, he wasn't able to do this" and gives a bad reference to the new employer.

That's messed up.

lol nah. it's kinda obvious that if you're going to ask somebody to write you a LOC, you trust him/her enough to write a good one.... unless that person is two-face.

 

[Jiro]

I never had a professor write a letter for me which they did not allow me to view (consequently, they were glowing letters of rec.), but even if a professor did request that I did not look at it, I still would. IMO, the person has EVERY RIGHT to see what is being said about them and to decide to withhold any letter that does not work to their advantage.

I was asked to write a letter of rec for a writing student who wanted to pursue graduate school in fiction writing. It was a dilemma for me because while the guy was a very talented writer, he was a lousy, uncommitted student. I wrote an honest letter speaking to the strengths of the student, but also warning that he had a tendency to not work hard. I did give the student the benefit of the doubt and framed the letter in such a way that it was a matter of him not being challenged enough and that he could perhaps improve his work ethic in the right environment.

One problem that professors often face is that they are asked to write letters for students whom SHOULD NOT be in graduate school (to address the OP, any student who regularly earns Cs and Bs should not be applying to grad school), and the professor knows it. What to do? Some academics do see it as a moral duty to keep mediocrity and unfit students out of the post-baccalaureate academy, but the fact is, these students will find their way in eventually. A professor who really feels that a student should not apply to graduate school should have a personal conference with that student and discuss this with them, as opposed to writing a damning letter of recommendation.

yea - it pretty much comes down to 2 choices

1. have a talk with him why you do not want to write a LOC for him
2. if you're very uncomfortable about "confrontation", you can write a "mediocre" LOC without negative tone.

 

[Steinhauer]

It is the tactic of choice in political debates.

 

[naisho]

I was asked to write a letter of rec for a writing student who wanted to pursue graduate school in fiction writing.
He was a lousy, uncommitted student. He had a tendency to not work hard. A matter of him not being challenged enough.

J/K with you, but I am in agreement with the part. They should at least have the decency to turn someone down instead of flaming them behind their backs. I suppose a bigger issue is to why unfit students and employees getting selected in the first place?

In the end, two-facer's suck severely though, and I would never pull something like this on anyone with the intent of jinxing them out just for the sake of a schadenfreude.

 

[Grayma]

Sometimes it's not that somebody is two-faced, it's that the person asking the review is really that clueless about what others think of him. My husband has been surprised by the people who have asked him for a recommendation (or worse, don't ask, but give his name as a reference)- including somebody he fired from the job for laziness and smoking on the job.

When asked, he just says, "You don't want me as a reference."

 

[deafskeptic]

I also imagine a lot of deaf people can or may face this situation if a previous employer or professor talks very badly of them.

Can picture stuff like them writing because John is deaf, I had to grade easy on him, or "I let John go on some mistakes he made at work because being deaf, he wasn't able to do this" and gives a bad reference to the new employer.

That's messed up.

I had problems like this because they had to make expectations due to my deafness. Some of my co-workers resented me for this.