General SOP questions

[Casper14]

Hi, I am applying for a PhD in EECS and have a few general questions regarding the Statement of Purpose. I ordered the questions in order of importance, if you only want to skim through them...

1.) Mentioning specific faculty members, but keeping my options open

In my SOP, I mention some members of faculty whose research I find interesting. Should I add a specific statement saying that I am not restricting myself to these professors? What I don't want is my application to get thrown out immediately because the people I mention are not accepting students or something similar. This brings me to the next question...

2.) Contacting specific faculty members

Should I make contact with the above-mentioned faculty members before submitting my application? It feels to me that if I do not email anyone, they might feel that I am not genuinely interested, or else I would have at least enquired. On the other hand, however, I do not want to annoy potential professors with generic questions before I have even submitted an application.

3.) Future goals

If I have not yet made up my mind as to whether I want to do research at a university or the R&D section of a company, would it hurt my chances if I said this? It feels to me that just saying that I want to pursue a career in research is a little generic.

4.) Mentioning current advisors

If my current advisors for my undergraduate project are not particularly well-known in their fields, should I mention their names in my SOP? They wrote my letters of recommendation, so I though that mentioning them might help place their letters in context.

Thanks!

[Bearcat1]

1) & 2) You should definitely find out if the people you want to work with are accepting students, and then mention only people who are in your statement. If you mention people who aren't, you look like you didn't do your homework. If you say your open to working with anyone, it may seem like you are just hoping to get in anywhere, and you may not have done your homework on the program.

3) I would say you want to do research and why and what kind. Just leave out the where, but make sure the rest is strong. Then you won't seem wishy-washy.

4) Don't mention them. You don't want to waste space in your statement with something that will be evident elsewhere in your application package.