How to provide the recommendation letters

Candidate role regarding letters of recommendation

The candidate’s role is reduced with respect to letters of recommendation. He/she is limited to requesting the letter of recommendation from each of his/her referees. The letters should not go through him/her and it is not his/her responsibility to send them to anyone else for processing in the process.

Role of the Referee Regarding Letters of Recommendation

The role of the referee is to write the letter of recommendation and upload it directly into the recruitment tool. He/she should not send it to the candidate, the selection committee or any other party involved in the process.

Please take note of the instructions for uploading letters of recommendation.

All the answers to your questions can be found in the Q&A document.

Important:
We will not take into consideration any recommendation letter that we would receive via another channel (email, letter, etc.).

How many letters of recommendation are required?

Minimum 3 to maximum 5 letters of recommendation are required for each application[1].

[1]       If a candidate applies for more than one position, 3 to 5 letter requests must be submitted for each of the positions for which he or she is applying. These letters can be requested from the same referees.  However, it will be necessary to ensure that these referees receive as many requests as there are positions for which their intervention is requested.  

From whom should they emanate?

  • These letters must be from internationally renowned scientific personalities who are not members of UCLouvain.
  • The recommendation of a professor from a foreign university who is also a visiting professor at UCLouvain is valid.

Who downloads the letter of recommendation?

  • In order to preserve the confidentiality and independence of the advice provided by the reference persons, the letters of recommendation will be uploaded directly by each reference person (in pdf format) according to the procedure described below.

What is the deadline for downloading letters of recommendation?

  • The deadline for downloading a letter of recommendation is November 26, 2021. 

I introduced a wrong email address for one of my referees: what can I do?

  • Log again in the application.
  • Introduce the name of your referee again with the correct data (again, name and email address …), just if it was a new referee; then another email will be sent. The 1st demand will simply remain there.

How can I know how many letters I have received?

  • Log again in the application and see how many of your references turned green.

My referee does not find the email with the link: what can I do?

  • Ask him/her to look in the ‘Spams’ mailbox.
  • If that does not work, check that the right address has been indicated.
  • If necessary, use the button “resend email”.
  • If your referee still does not get anything, contact us via gestion-recrutement-academique@uclouvain.be.
  • Then log in again, and check if the references of this person have turned green.

Can you acknowledge receipt of my referees’ letters?

  • We do not acknowledge receipt, but the applicant can log in again and check whether the recommendation letter has been successfully uploaded (a green message shows: “Recommendation letter received”).

Important :

We will not take into consideration any recommendation letter that we would receive via another channel (email, letter, etc.).
Procedure for uploading a letter of recommendation