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[from_my_sunny_isle]

I am a graduate student in the sciences who is applying for entry to another graduate program.  I have completed one year in an MS program, but I would like to change my focus of study.  Therefore, it is necessary for me to change horses midstream.

My question is: If only one of my letters of recommendation are from faculty at my current university, will this hurt my chances for admission to a competitive program? 

One recommender is a professor at my current university, and the others are professionals in my field.  My reasoning is in selecting them is that they have been amazing mentors who have really changed my scholarly life.  While they are best suited to evaluate my strengths and weaknesses, I am concerned that there may be a negative impact on my application.

[kecko]

IF your other referees are professionals, you're going to need at least one reference from your school. Do your advisors support your idea to change streams? Can you find someone who is sympathetic to your reasons?

[wowisback]

What you are doing is absolutely worthless. In fact, you can kiss off getting admitted to another university.

The admission committee is looking for evidence that you are capable of dong graduate level work. Previous graduate work is a good indicator, but the committees rely heavily on letters of recommendation from faculty. Those letters from professionals are devoid of any value particularly if they are from colleagues rather than supervisors. Why? Because those professionals have no specialized knowledge about your ability to do graduate level work.  Moreover, the fact that you provided only one faculty member and the rest are "professionals" sends one loud and clear message to the admissions committee: you cherry-picked the faculty member because other faculty  would have given you a mediocre to poor rating. You therefore had to use professionals to get the requisite number of recommendations letters.

You outsmarted yourself. And in the process, shot yourself in the foot...

[oldie]

It all depends.

It should not affect provided you had competitive U/G GPA and a reasonable performance in your current program. However, why not finish up this program and try something later? or change it within the same college?

[oldie]

Just to add the the previous post.......

I personally dont have this type of experience. Rationally, it should work this way.

1. If you have very competitive U/G grades, you should be able to either enter directly or change later into a competitive college.

2. If you have average U/G grades, strong performance on graduate courses should help you get into competitive program.

Now if you were in category 1 above, you should be OK

On the other hand, if you are in category 2, stick out and finish your current degree with steller results!

[smart_e_pantz]

What you are doing is absolutely worthless. In fact, you can kiss off getting admitted to another university.

The admission committee is looking for evidence that you are capable of dong graduate level work. Previous graduate work is a good indicator, but the committees rely heavily on letters of recommendation from faculty. Those letters from professionals are devoid of any value particularly if they are from colleagues rather than supervisors. Why? Because those professionals have no specialized knowledge about your ability to do graduate level work.  Moreover, the fact that you provided only one faculty member and the rest are "professionals" sends one loud and clear message to the admissions committee: you cherry-picked the faculty member because other faculty  would have given you a mediocre to poor rating. You therefore had to use professionals to get the requisite number of recommendations letters.

You outsmarted yourself. And in the process, shot yourself in the foot...

I think hell just froze over....  I agree with the substance of what wow posted!  Now, if we could just get wow to be a little nicer, I might not feel so bad about agreeing with him.

[oldie]

Ivy schools do look at professional letters if these are from peers in your own professional area. At master's level, there should not be too many objections in transferring, provided the degree does not require dissertation and grades are good; many U.S. master's degrees do not require dissertation (Canadians and British do). At doctoral level everyone seeks to mentor someone who would stick around to do some serious work. I hope it adds to the discussion.

[philo]

What you are doing is absolutely worthless. In fact, you can kiss off getting admitted to another university.

The admission committee is looking for evidence that you are capable of dong graduate level work. Previous graduate work is a good indicator, but the committees rely heavily on letters of recommendation from faculty. Those letters from professionals are devoid of any value particularly if they are from colleagues rather than supervisors. Why? Because those professionals have no specialized knowledge about your ability to do graduate level work.  Moreover, the fact that you provided only one faculty member and the rest are "professionals" sends one loud and clear message to the admissions committee: you cherry-picked the faculty member because other faculty  would have given you a mediocre to poor rating. You therefore had to use professionals to get the requisite number of recommendations letters.

You outsmarted yourself. And in the process, shot yourself in the foot...

Did you even read the OP before posting, or could you just not wait to say something hurtful?  Nothing has been done at this point, as I take it; the question is whether what s/he is thinking about doing would be a bad idea or not. 

To the OP:  Unless these professionals are especially well placed to evaluate your ability to do graduate work, I wouldn't go that route.  At the very minimum, I'd try to get one more letter from a faculty member.

[larryc]

Since you are applying to begin in a graduate program, would it be possible to get a letter from one of your undergrad professors? This might be tricky if much time has passed, your request should discreetly remind them of who the hell you are and what good work you did for them.

[seniorscholar]

As a director of graduate studies (although in a different field) I'd add one other consideration to the letters from professionals in your field. Are you confident that they can speak to your abilities to do graduate work? Do they have graduate degrees? Do they know what's important to current research in the field?

I mention this because I so often see Ph.D. applications that have one letter from an undergraduate instructor (often from a very good liberal arts program but obviously from someone who has no idea of the demands of graduate work at present); one from a big-name lawyer on the firm's stationery that says, essentially, "this is a wonderful person" without even hinting whether the applicant has been a low-level clerical worker, a student volunteer for some cause, or is perhaps a completely unknown person whose father is a friend of the lawyer; and one from a supervisor at the ice-cream store where the applicant has been "hard working and very pleasant to customers." This assembly hurts far more than it helps, though the lawyer's letter probably could have been made very impressive if it spoke to specific skills and interests that would suggest the applicant's potential for graduate work.

[anonforthis]

it will have a negative impact

[la_profesora]

I would think it would depend on the field.  I am applying to doctoral programs in music performance right now, and one of my recommendations is going to come from my current voice teacher, who has no academic affiliation, but is a relatively well-known professional singer.  So far, I haven't had anyone suggest it would hurt my application (and I did run it past my former grad school advisor, who's also tapped as a rec).