E-Mailing a Professor Before Admissions Decision is Released?

[lawster]

There's a professor I'm extremely interested in potentially working with, and I was thinking about e-mailing this professor to flag my interests/similar research projects before admissions decisions are released. Basically I would be asking if he's planning on taking students in the near future (a question I should have asked earlier but unfortunately didn't, although I did talk about him in my personal statement).

I understand this might be risky, but is there some unwritten cultural norm that this is bad and could blackball my candidacy?

[Loric]

It's frowned on. Time to contact is before the application.

Also , do you really want his reply if it's nothing but bad news but then still have to wait for the process of apps to finish? Think hard about that.

[TakeMyCoffeeBlack]

Political science profs on these boards say you can certainly go for it. Either a) you'll get a cold response (or no response), which doesn't speak highly of the professor/program barring some circumstance that caused them to act that way or they'll give you honest, friendly information. I went for it and got the former just yesterday, so be prepared for that possibility. 

[MattDest]

I don't have any solid information on this, but I'm with Loric on this one (the sky is falling! pigs are flying! Hell has frozen over!   ). I think it might look bad if you are e-mailing them while the application process is going on. Ideally, this is something you should have done *before* you applied if you were going to do it at all. That said, I can't imagine that doing so would be a huge detriment to your chances either. I wouldn't fret about it either way. 

[objectivityofcontradiction]

I made contact with at least one person in each department that I applied to, but I did this before I clicked 'submit.' I suppose I'd agree with Loric and MattD that now it may be a bit too late. But just as a rule of thumb to any one who might read this post in the future: you should absolutely be doing this before you submit your apps. Professors, although they probably receive swaths of emails, will remember the name and the implied interest of a student who sent them a couple emails in the months prior, and whose name they then see in front of them on the desk during the admissions process. 

[Hopephily]

Interesting idea. I suppose I thought there was some unspoken norm against this. I was in contact with a couple of professors (at schools I applied to) but it was about a paper of mine and not directly about working with them (although it might have been implied).  

[sacklunch]

No. You have already submitted the application. I don't think it will *hurt* you, but I can't imagine it helping you either. At this point, let that shit ride.

[lawster]

OK thanks everyone. Looks like it's too late to do this sort of thing and not worth the risk at this stage in the process.

[annie_lull]

i think it depends on the situation. I e-mailed this one professor whom i was already in contact with just to let the prof know that i submitted my application and I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I was too concerned that maybe it's against some admission rule where you're not supposed to contact a POI after submission, but i got a friendly response and it was all good. (whether or not i get in is a different question.)

 

but like everybody else mentioned, i would be cautious. I would certainly NOT e-mail a prof you're not already in contact with. Introduction e-mails should happen before you submit applications.

 

either way, those e-mails don't necessarily determine the chance you have with schools, so i wouldn't worry about it too much. good luck!!