Need suggestions on how to answer an email from a professor

[msakbo01]

I need your advice about how to answer an email. Here's the situation.

 

The school that I got accepted to has asked me whether I would attend the Open House in March. Since I'm in SE Asia and have a full-time job, I told them that I will not be able to make it.

However, since I won't be able to visit the school, I've asked for contacts of graduate students under 2 professors that I'm interested in working with, professor A and B (I'm interested in working with professor A more than professor

 

Both professors gave me contacts of their students. 

However, professor B also emailed me saying that he has a collaboration with professor A on a topic, and said that they think that I'm perfect for that work. professor B also attached couple of papers with the email. He is waiting to hear back from me whether I'm interested. (professor A is also CCed in the email)

 

Here are my thoughts

1. Since I'm still waiting to hear back from other schools, it's not 100% that I will attend this school

2. Even if I will attend this school, I don't want to say yes to professor B right now. Even though the topic is interesting, I want to keep my options of working with Professor A on other topics open.

 

Any advice/suggestions on how to answer the email will be greatly appreciated

 

 

[Inyo]

I would thank both professors for the information (in one email to both), and say you look forward to learning more about the research that they are conducting, perhaps mentioning that you will be reading the papers soon.

 

I think it's fine to say that you're still in the invesigating phase.

 

I had a similar recent interaction with a professor. I have been admitted to school X and school Y. At school X, professor X REALLY wants me to come and work with her. According to my background, she thinks I'd be a good fit for project A BUT based on previous conversations, she did also attach a paper on project B--which is far more interesting to me! She also offered summer employment (on either project A or .

 

I am not committed to school X. I thanked her for the information and said how interesting I found project B. I said I looked forward to learning more about the project. I turned down the summer employment for personal reasons.

 

I then added that while school X is very high on my list, I am also considering school Y. I pointed out that my probable PI at school Y is actually the person who told me to apply to school X, and that no matter what happens, I look forward to working with her in the future.

 

What I've been trying to keep in mind through all of this is that ALL of these people may end up being my colleagues at some point in the future. I'm betting that honesty is the best policy. Since I'm going into a very small field, I am going out of my way to make sure that I tell everyone in the field how interesting I find their work.

 

One thing that's important to remember is that all of these people have been in your shoes at some point. They get that you might not want to be 100% committed to a particular project before you even show up!