Would a rejection ever come from a POI?

[jriveracal]

Just had a nightmare that my POI sent me a very nicely written email to tell me that while my research sounds cool, he doesn't think he is a great fit for my interests and wishes me good luck elsewhere.

For sociology, would this ever happen? I would imagine interviews and acceptances may come from POI's but rejections would just come from the department/portal.

I just want to be mentally prepared for all of this. lol.

[xyz234]

59 minutes ago, jriveracal said:

Just had a nightmare that my POI sent me a very nicely written email to tell me that while my research sounds cool, he doesn't think he is a great fit for my interests and wishes me good luck elsewhere.

For sociology, would this ever happen? I would imagine interviews and acceptances may come from POI's but rejections would just come from the department/portal.

I just want to be mentally prepared for all of this. lol.

Most sociology programs do not admit you to work with one specific person, unlike some other fields. A single POI is not going to make or break your application (especially if they're not on the admissions committee) and most interactions you have with the department about admissions decisions will go through someone like the department chair, head of the admissions committee, or director of graduate studies.

Specific faculty I had listed as potential advisors did contact me after I had been admitted places, but I did not interact with them beforehand or about the application process.

Edited December 24, 2018 by xyz234

[socchi92]

Probably not unless you have some sort of relationship with them where it would be inappropriate for them not to say something about the bad news. I'm also regularly having dreams (good and bad) about this process!!! 

[CozyD]

Last week I actually got a very nice rejection email from a POI at a Psychology program. (That's not Sociology, so it might be totally different.) We'd exchanged pretty short emails before I applied to the program. I actually really appreciated the gesture though. They said some kind, reassuring things and left the door open for us to stay in touch about our shared research interests.