proceed with caution? (LOR, email, a busy professor?)

[troll crackers]

Hi all! I've been in contact with one of my old professors for a little over a month. I've been seeking out his advice on grad schools to apply to, and ultimately I would like to ask him if he would write me a letter of recommendation. The problem is that communication has been spotty.

During an exchange of emails (emails that indicated a follow up email would be on the way), he stopped communicating. I emailed him when I didn't hear from him, and he followed up a few days later. The last email he sent mentioned helping me out by checking out some grad school websites to see if he was familiar with the work of some of the faculty. I replied, thanking him and offering to help since it seemed like a bit of a chore to dig through all of that info. He has not replied to my email in 12 days.

Part of me says, just drop it, he wants to be left alone or is clearly very busy, but the other part of me feels that maybe he just needs to be reminded.... again.

What do you think?

[dendy]

It's not completely clear what you're asking... If you are just referring to the issue of him checking out the grad school websites, maybe drop it. It was nice of him to offer but he's clearly busy and you should be capable of doing your own research on schools. If you mean to drop communication entirely and find new recommender--I wouldn't. He clearly likes you and wants to help to succeed and could therefore write you a great letter, though he might need a little prodding to get the letters submitted in time.

[rkg2012]

I agree with dendy. Profs can be quite absent-minded. I had one prof close to me simply forget to respond to me and leave me paranoid for several weeks...for no reason. I was over-thinking things. Another had to be constantly prodded to get my recs in (and several were submitted late), even though I'm pretty sure he had excellent things to say about me.