Reaching out to multiple POIs?

[okletstry]

Hello! I'm wondering if it is normal and/or recommended to reach out to more than one professor within a department? I have reached out to the person I would be most interested in working with at the schools I'm applying to, but should I be reaching out to a second or even third? Should I reach out only if I'm not feeling confident about my first choice?

Any advice would be appreciated!

[PsyDuck90]

This may be discipline specific, but I know in Psych it is quite normal. Most applications ask you to rank order POIs and like to see 2-3 faculty members. 

[PokePsych]

yes - also because some departments may even 'prefer' someone who can work with multiple faculty members!

[gillis_55]

A few weeks ago I was reading The Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical & Counselling Psychology (2016/2017 edition) and was surprised to see them cautioning strongly against reaching out to multiple POIs:

"Students have asked us whether it is acceptable to send letters to more than one faculty member at the same program. Despite the fact that applicants may have multiple research and clinical interests, most faculty (ourselves included) react negatively to learning that the same person has written to more than one faculty member. Remember, there is a certain amount of self-interest involved - we're looking for bright, motivated students to collaborate in research and practice. It can be awkward when an admissions committee is discussing an applicant, and two faculty express a desire to to work with him/her, only to discover that the applicant has been actively expressing interest in both of them. Our advice: unless a few faculty members share highly overlapping research interests, don't write to more than one faculty member in any graduate program. If you do write to more than one, be open about it in your emails."

This runs counter to the advice I've seen on here, so make of that what you will. I personally have decided to only reach out to one at each program, but a case could still be made for reaching out to multiple POIs to increase your odds that one of them might take a particular interest in you. The risk is that all of them take an interest (what a great problem!), and you're left to explain why you sent an email to several of them - especially if their research interests are quite different. 

[gillis_55]

15 hours ago, okletstry said:

Thank you all for the help! @dougie what you said was basically my hesitation -- that it might look like I'm going behind the backs of POIs my expressing interest in multiple people or that I don't actually have a specific research interest that aligns with theirs if I'm changing my story slightly from person to person. So far I've only reached out to one person per school but may reach out to a second when my initial response was lukewarm at best.

No problem, glad it's helpful. And I agree you can reach out to a 2nd person, especially when the interest was lukewarm - just include a line that you've been in contact with other faculty members like Dr. XYZ but you're also interested in this person's research for ABC reasons. 

[okletstry]

Thank you all for the help! @dougie what you said was basically my hesitation -- that it might look like I'm going behind the backs of POIs my expressing interest in multiple people or that I don't actually have a specific research interest that aligns with theirs if I'm changing my story slightly from person to person. So far I've only reached out to one person per school but may reach out to a second when my initial response was lukewarm at best.

[PokePsych]

On 11/4/2018 at 2:51 PM, dougie said:

A few weeks ago I was reading The Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical & Counselling Psychology (2016/2017 edition) and was surprised to see them cautioning strongly against reaching out to multiple POIs:

"Students have asked us whether it is acceptable to send letters to more than one faculty member at the same program. Despite the fact that applicants may have multiple research and clinical interests, most faculty (ourselves included) react negatively to learning that the same person has written to more than one faculty member. Remember, there is a certain amount of self-interest involved - we're looking for bright, motivated students to collaborate in research and practice. It can be awkward when an admissions committee is discussing an applicant, and two faculty express a desire to to work with him/her, only to discover that the applicant has been actively expressing interest in both of them. Our advice: unless a few faculty members share highly overlapping research interests, don't write to more than one faculty member in any graduate program. If you do write to more than one, be open about it in your emails."

This runs counter to the advice I've seen on here, so make of that what you will. I personally have decided to only reach out to one at each program, but a case could still be made for reaching out to multiple POIs to increase your odds that one of them might take a particular interest in you. The risk is that all of them take an interest (what a great problem!), and you're left to explain why you sent an email to several of them - especially if their research interests are quite different. 

I think this also depends on department culture (and you may want to contact current grad students about that).

At both my master's school and now at my PhD program everyone sorta works with everyone and gets encouraged to join multiple labs.

I think it's important to have a clear idea what you want to research (e.g., I study situational/ecological influences on behavior, specifically with a focus on resource distribution) and am able to tie how this would work with specific faculty members (e.g., someone who studies morality/fairness, someone who studies ecology, someone who studies person-environment fit). So I'm not being vague but rather focus on where I see fit.