Reaching out to POI - which e-mail address do I use?

[hellodarkn3ss]

Hello All,

This may be a silly question, but I figured I'd give it a go. I'm interested in reaching out to a few POI at some of the programs I'm thinking about applying to -- however, I'm not exactly sure which e-mail address to use. I graduated with my Master's in 2015 and still retain control and use of my grad school .edu address, but now I work in a research lab/group with a different affiliation (in which one of the programs I'm interested in is affiliated as well).

Is there an etiquette in place for which e-mail address to use? Should I forgo either of those and use my personal gmail address? Not sure what would be the proper route...

Any thoughts would be great -- thanks in advance. 

[Quantitative_Psychology]

Personally, I would suggest not using a personal email address. I do not think it matters which email address you use as long as it has a .edu at the end. I believe academics are much more trusting and likely to open emails from strangers who they can identify are also in academia. Maybe I read too much into things, but this has been my impression. Also, I suspect a .edu email is less likely to be mistakenly identified as junk mail.

[cmykrgb]

I agree with the above, using a .edu email is much more professional compared to a personal email. As of which .edu email to use I used the one from my undergraduate instead of the one from my current institute only because I wanted to keep my work email strictly work-related, but you should use whichever .edu that is more convenient for you.