I think I know what the answers are going to be, but since I can’t get the idea out of my head, I’m going to ask:
Can you re-use an old LOR? DS is going to be applying to one school and one special program that accept a LOR from someone other than a teacher. The plan had been to ask someone that has essentially been a mentor to DS for about 4 years as part of an organization he’s in. About a year ago, he wrote what I thought was a great LOR for DS for something. Now, the last email I got from him was extremely disorganized and difficult to read. Another parent who is closer to this individual has expressed concerns (independent of the email I got) about cognitive decline/dimentia. It gives me concern in having DS ask him for another LOR. We have the original LOR and I honestly believe it is a stronger LOR than anything DS’s teachers will write.
Would it be possible to send a copy of the old LOR with a note about how this individual has known DS for years, but unfortunately it is not possible to obtain a new LOR from him?
It would sound acceptable to me to simply ask the mentor if the old LOR can be used. Unless the content of the letter is outdated, it doesn’t seem necessary to me to note that it was not written super recently.
I would ask the mentor for permission to reuse the original letter. Since your son knows him so well, have him politely ask if he (your son) could reuse the letter but change the date and print a new copy for the mentor to sign.
I would not send any sort of letter saying you couldn’t get a more recent recommendation - I also wouldn’t judge the recommender based on hearsay or one email. My goodness, anytime I send an email from my phone, I often later find mistakes!
I’ll need to think about this a little bit more and how we might be able to approach things as we only have a hard copy of the original letter. But it sounds like it isn’t completely out of the question like I thought.
I think he would appreciate a) not having to write another letter and b) the nice compliment your son will give him about how great the letter was and how valuable it would be to use it for college applications.