Letter of rec from research advisor or professor

AI Thread Summary
A letter of recommendation from a research advisor who has limited knowledge of the applicant may not be as valuable as one from a classroom instructor who knows the applicant well. The applicant is considering including research experience in graduate school applications but is concerned about the quality of the recommendation letters. They plan to balance their letters by including recommendations from other advisors and classroom instructors to avoid overwhelming any single advisor with requests. There is a concern about whether admissions committees will question the absence of letters from every advisor. Ultimately, the emphasis is on the content of the letters rather than the titles of the writers, suggesting that strong, personalized letters are more impactful.
lonewolf219
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I know having a letter of recommendation from a research advisor is great. However, the research advisor I am currently working with barely knows me. He will be my advisor for about 5 more weeks, but I do not see him suddenly becoming interested in my project (I'm working with the postdoc), or interested in me/my goals.

I plan to include this research experience in my graduate school applications. I will also have letters from other advisors I have done research with (I don't want to ask each advisor to write 8 letters, so I was going to include classroom instructors to spread it out)

First question: Is a letter from a research advisor who barely knows me better than a letter from a classroom instructor who does?

Second question: Will a committee look at my research experience and wonder why there are not letters from every advisor in my application?

Thanks.
 
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What matters more than who writes the letter is what the letter says. You need to select people based on your best estimate of that.
 
Vanadium 50, thanks for your perspective ... Your wisdom is always appreciated !
 
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