<p>a scientist i know suggested that i contact professors whose work i'm interested in before i apply to grad school. he thinks it will help my chances of getting into grad school. is this a good idea, or does the overall departmental strength matter more?</p>
<p>A lot of people do it. I can’t recall anyone who’s encountered anything negative resulting from contacting professors early. I don’t know if it will increase your chances, but it certainly allows you to get to know a professor better and might help you determine where you fit in.</p>
<p>This is a great idea. It may help to foster the kind of enthusiasm that will help you through the admissions process. Also, if you can sufficiently impress a potential PI, you may help your case when it comes to being offered an interview. Be prepared to have a tough skin when it comes to people blatantly blowing off your emails or sending you some form letter indicating that they are too important to answer the likes of you.</p>
<p>Many professors don’t even open contact emails of this sort. If you think about it, what can you do besides tell the professor that you’re interested in their work, and they already think everyone is. You won’t establish any sort of meaningful contact, so you really won’t accomplish anything, though you risk being perceived as annoying. If you want to contact someone about work being done in a particular department, ask current grad students. Contact information for grad students can be found on most department web pages.</p>
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<p>this is what i figured. my advisor suggested that i apply to places based on the overall strength of the faculty. i suppose one can have success with contacting professors, too. i think i’ll try contacting a few and see where that leads me. this doesn’t seem like something to stress about, though.</p>
<p>I have had mixed results with this. Many professors ignored me completely, some referred me to the department and then dropped it. Some were quite open to discussing me work and theirs. No one indicated any problems with my doing so, and the professors and department admins I spoke to dd not have any problems with it. The worst I got was an admonition from a department secretary that professors could not offer admission…</p>
<p>I think it is perfectly fine to contact professors as long as you remember the following:</p>
<p>1) Don’t harass - if they don’t respond, they’re not interested in talking. Yet.</p>
<p>2) If you are not qualified to be there, talking to a prof will not help.</p>
<p>3) If you ARE qualified, talking to prof’s early on CAN help.</p>
<p>4) Your goal in talking to a prof should be to determine their current line of research and what they are looking for in a grad student. If they are receptive, THEN you can start selling yourself.</p>
<p>5) If you are a bad fit, admit and ask for a referral - I found my current advisor when a prof at the school suggested me to him.</p>
<p>6) Some prof’s will want a resume before they speak to you - they don’t want to waste time on someone who will not pass the bar. I attached mine to any initial emails I sent.</p>
<p>7) You need to know there stuff before you email. Asking something that is on their website makes you look a shmuck.</p>
<p>8) Do not ever EVER ask who is on the admissions committee - if they want you to know they will tell you, asking makes you look like a brown-noser.</p>
<p>9) Most grad students are willing to talk about their experience, so include them on your list. If the prof does not respond on their own, the RA may get them to.</p>
<p>Cosmicfish and dntw8up bring up a good point. Current graduate students are a great resource. I contacted grad students at nearly every program I applied to and got some info that I wouldn’t have otherwise eg. which faculty member is leaving this summer, one discipline gets excluded from the rest of the department. Also, you can get a feel for the character of the department by interacting with current grad students, I saved myself the application money for UPenn because I did this.</p>
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<p>I disagree. Although I do think contacting graduate students can be helpful, contacting professors can be as well. </p>
<p>I normally e-mail just to ask if they’re going to be accepting graduate students this coming year. I’ve gotten a few of the, “Thanks for the interest, wish you luck,” e-mails, a few more no-responses, but I’ve gotten a couple really useful responses from awesome PI’s. One professor replied with a full page of useful info, letting me know that he likes to keep the number of grad students in his lab low to facilitate mentorship (but he was pretty sure he’d have an opening), asked me to look him up/call him if I was invited to interview, and gave me the names of three or four other faculty that were doing research in line with my interests in case he was full.</p>
<p>Another professor gave me a warm response and, though he didn’t have contact info on his page for graduate students, obliged and linked me to slideshows put together by grad students of current research going on in his lab.</p>
<p>In short, it’s worth a shot, even if only to make sure the reason you’re applying to the school will be open to you joining their lab.</p>
<p>It can be worth it to contact professors, but only if you have something specific and targeted to say to them about their work/lab. It’s absolutely not worth it to email every professor in the department a generic “I find your work really interesting” email – if you’re going to email, it should be to a very targeted list of PIs, and you should be very clear that you’ve read their work and are possibly interested in a lab rotation.</p>
<p>That said, I agree with everything people have said – as dntw8up says, many professors don’t even read these emails. However, as cosmicfish points out, a highly targeted email can be useful if you don’t absolutely expect a response.</p>
<p>Speaking as a professor, I ignore emails that are generic. I only respond to email inquiries that demonstrate that the individual has actually investigated my research and is knowledgeable and has real purpose in their questions</p>