Recommendation Letters

Draft recommendation and reference letters for Adam W. Stauffer's students in his established
house style, working only from verified facts.

Ground rule: verify, never invent (non-negotiable)

Every substantive claim in a letter must come from a source the student actually supplied — a
grade from the gradebook/transcript, a fact from their résumé, an objective stated in their own
words (email, personal statement). Never infer, estimate, or fabricate grades, GPAs,
employers, job titles, dates, achievements, career goals, or motivations.

• If a needed fact is missing, leave a generic placeholder or ask the user — do not guess.
• Placeholders stay generic and descriptive: <FIN 321 grade>, <student's stated objective>,
  <employer / role from résumé>.
• Never write a specific value you have not verified, not even as a placeholder — e.g. never
  <A+>, never a made-up firm or figure. A specific-looking placeholder reads as a real fact once
  the brackets are removed, which is exactly the failure this rule prevents.
• This applies to characterizations too: don't assert a student "excelled" or was "top of the
  class" unless the record supports it.

When unsure whether something is verified, treat it as unverified.

Where things live

• Master template (canonical, fill-in): assets/master-recommendation-template.docx in this
  skill. It holds the fixed scaffold (bio + signature verbatim), a paste-ready course block for
  every course Adam teaches (BUS 313 / 314 / FIN 321 / BUS 620 / BUS 629 / BUS 122B), purpose-line
  and closing-line menus, combo guidance, and style notes. Every fill-in is a generic <green field>.
• Finished letters + student materials: recommendations/<YYYY-MM>-<lastname>-<firstname>/ at
  the repo root. This tree is gitignored (student PII); see recommendations/README.md. Date =
  the letter's authored month. Multi-target applicants keep one folder with a file per school/employer.
• Grades to fill <course grade> fields come from the gradebook, not memory. Gradebooks are
  consolidated under each offering's ignore/<YYYY-Season>/grades/. The *_FinalGrades_*.xlsx
  exports carry the letter grade in column P (and the numeric in column O); the plain
  *_Grades_*.csv exports carry only the number — convert those with the SSOT scale in
  the ai-lms grading skill (C:\GitHub\ai-lms\.claude\skills\grading\references\grading-scale.md;
  docs/grading-scale.md here is a mirror) or its helper
  (e.g. python C:/GitHub/ai-lms/.claude/skills/grading/scripts/final_grades/letter_grade.py 92 → A-). Never guess a letter from a number —
  read column P or apply the scale.

Workflow

1. Gather the source facts first. Adam's practice is to ask the student for (a) a bullet list of
   what to highlight and (b) their résumé; the request email often also names the target
   program/role. Read those before drafting. If a grade is needed, get it from the gradebook.
2. Build from the master template, never by copying another student's letter. Copying a prior
   letter drags that student's PII (and sometimes their grades) into the new one. Start from
   assets/master-recommendation-template.docx.
3. Assemble: pick one Purpose Line → paste the Course Block(s) for the course(s) taught (stack
   clauses for combos) → write 1–2 differentiator paragraphs mapped from the student's own bullets
   and résumé → pick a Closing Line. Fill every <field>, including <he/she/they> pronouns and
   <course grade>. Leave any field you can't verify as a placeholder and flag it to the user.
4. Render onto the branded letterhead (see below) and save the .docx + a .pdf into the
   student's folder.

Rendering onto the UH letterhead (required for outgoing letters + PDFs)

Outgoing letters and PDFs use Adam's branded base, recommendations/recommendation-template-format.docx
— UH/Shidler letterhead (first-page header) + the signature block with his signature and seal images.
That base stays gitignored (it embeds his signature) and is never bundled into the tracked repo.

Build with scripts/build_letter.py, which swaps only the body (title → closing) onto the base and
leaves the letterhead, footers, and signature block untouched:

python .claude/skills/recommendation-letters/scripts/build_letter.py content.json

content.json = {base, out, title, date, recipient_lines[], salutation, body_paragraphs[], space_after, line_spacing, title_before}. Then convert to PDF with LibreOffice directly
("C:\Program Files\LibreOffice\program\soffice.exe" --headless --convert-to pdf --outdir <dir> <docx>).

One page, always — unless there is a genuine reason for more (rare). If a letter spills to a
second page, tighten in this order before ever cutting substance: lower space_after (160 → ~130),
then line_spacing (1.0 → ~0.90). Verify the page count from the rendered PDF (pdfinfo), and
confirm the title clears the letterhead (raise title_before, default 560, if it crowds "MĀNOA").
Note: if the target .docx is open in Word the save fails ("Device or resource busy") — build to a
scratch path, then place it once the file is closed.

House style (what a finished letter looks like)

Always one page unless there is a genuine reason for more (rare). 4–5 short paragraphs:

1. Purpose + bio. Purpose line, then the fixed bio verbatim: "I am a Faculty Lecturer in
   Finance and Economics at the Shidler College of Business, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. Before
   entering academia, I served as Chief Investment Officer at Springline Capital, and previously
   worked as a trader at Barclays Capital and Lehman Brothers. I hold an MBA from The Wharton School
   and was formerly a CFA Charterholder."
2. Course(s) + grade + performance — from a Course Block.
3. Differentiators — professional experience, character, purpose, drawn only from the student's
   résumé and their own "what to highlight" list (1–2 paragraphs).
4. Close — escalating endorsement ("my strongest / highest recommendation … without
   reservation" for top students); add a direct-reference offer with contact info for job letters.

Signature block (verbatim):

Sincerely,

Adam W. Stauffer

Faculty Lecturer, Finance & Economics
Shidler College of Business
University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa
adamstau@hawaii.edu

Conventions

• Diacriticals: always "University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa" with the ʻokina and macron.
• Audience framing: mirror the reader — admissions committees → "your program / cohort";
  employers → "your team." Never frame the reader as "recruiters."
• GPA: include only when it is a genuine strength and you have the verified number; otherwise
  let applied accomplishments carry the letter.
• Generating the .docx: render onto the branded base with scripts/build_letter.py (see
  "Rendering onto the UH letterhead" above) — it keeps the letterhead Times New Roman 12pt house
  look. On Windows, preview/convert by calling
  "C:\Program Files\LibreOffice\program\soffice.exe" --headless --convert-to pdf directly — the
  docx skill's soffice.py wrapper fails there (it assumes a Unix socket). For deeper .docx
  mechanics, use the docx skill.