The Art of Mentioning Professors in SoP

[day_manderly]

I think I'm not the only one struggling with this. So I know that:

• you shouldn't mention professors you haven't contacted as your potential advisors;
• you shouldn't mention anyone if you haven't checked whether they are alive, still there, available for interaction (courses, talks, etc.);
• it's good to talk about potential advisors in SoP, because otherwise the adcomm will not know what to do with you and which faculty should have a look at your application.

Now, the question. If you know that a professor cannot advise you (not being a standing faculty, etc.), but will still be available for discussions, and you admire them - how should you talk about them?

My SoP has it like this now: 'Regarding the faculty I would like to work with, I must mention Professors Cool and Great'.

Now, Professor Great cannot be any PhD student's advisor, but I'm still looking forward to discussing various problems in my field with them.

Professor Cool is my intended advisor.

I don't want to appear badly informed about the internal politics of the school. Meanwhile, I still want to mention Professor Great.

Background: advisors do not direct your whole trajectory in my field, it's all rather loose, not like in Biology or smth, where funding is linked to project leaders.

Edited November 1, 2016 by day_manderly
minor correction

[Triangular]

I'm not sure what the answer to your question is, but I would certainly be interested in hearing it as well.

I'm having the same problem with a prof who is in a different department, however she is a senior member of a center conducting research in the department to which I'm applying, and her research is very applicable to mine. I'd like to mention her, since she would be around and available, but of course she could not be my advisor, so I'm not sure how to frame it. (there are several profs within the dept as well who have highly relevant research interests)

[musiklehrer]

What if the adviser with whom you'd like to study is so renowned and prestigious within your discipline, that contacting them would seem inappropriate and gauche? 

[DBear]

20 hours ago, day_manderly said:

My SoP has it like this now: 'Regarding the faculty I would like to work with, I must mention Professors Cool and Great'.

Now, Professor Great cannot be any PhD student's advisor, but I'm still looking forward to discussing various problems in my field with them.

I think I would phrase it just a tad differently. I'm assuming there is a line or two about how great you think the program is, I'd link it to that:

As a leader in the Coolness discipline, I feel like blah blah this and that excellence in research, especially with faculty like Prof Renowned who has helped shape discourse in Coolness.

Or

I trust that with my work with Prof PotentialAdvisor will be further "good adjective" with discussions and interaction with renowned faculty like Prof Renowned who has helped shape both the discipline and my past research. 

Just my two cents and thanks for the great question 

[day_manderly]

1 minute ago, DBear said:

I think I would phrase it just a tad differently. I'm assuming there is a line or two about how great you think the program is, I'd link it to that:

As a leader in the Coolness discipline, I feel like blah blah this and that excellence in research, especially with faculty like Prof Renowned who has helped shape discourse in Coolness.

Or

I trust that with my work with Prof PotentialAdvisor will be further "good adjective" with discussions and interaction with renowned faculty like Prof Renowned who has helped shape both the discipline and my past research. 

Just my two cents and thanks for the great question 

Thank you, that sounds great!

[TakeruK]

21 hours ago, day_manderly said:

My SoP has it like this now: 'Regarding the faculty I would like to work with, I must mention Professors Cool and Great'.

Now, Professor Great cannot be any PhD student's advisor, but I'm still looking forward to discussing various problems in my field with them.

Professor Cool is my intended advisor.

This wording you suggest is really awkward. As someone said, I wouldn't phrase it that way. Here's a sample of something one could write in a SOP. Let's assume that in earlier paragraphs, you already established your interest in the study of apple pie making:

I am excited for the opportunity to study Apple Pieology at University of Pielandia. I would be interested in working with Prof. Cool to study Crust Layering. I also anticipate collaborations with Prof. Great on the sugar-to-apple ratio. The research facilities at the University of Pielandia, particularly the Pie Recipe Library and the Automatic Filling Injector, would also be helpful.

---

Basically, I think you should mention professors in a way to achieve two goals: 1) you want to show that you have done some homework on the department and know who studies what and 2) you want to give the committee an easy way to "classify" you and basically suggest an answer to the question they are all thinking "Where would this applicant fit into our department?".

In the above example, I show a way to distinguish between who you want your advisor to be and who you will just collaborate with. But, you don't have to always distinguish this, you could just say that you are interested in Prof. Cool's Crust Layering work and Prof. Great's sugar-to-apple ratio work, without specifying that you want to work with one or the other.

3 hours ago, musiklehrer said:

What if the adviser with whom you'd like to study is so renowned and prestigious within your discipline, that contacting them would seem inappropriate and gauche? 

Maybe your field is different, but I wouldn't think there would exist a professor so renowned and prestigious that it would be a faux pas to even email them. They are still human, and remember, their fame is only within their field. To people in the field, they might be the most famous person, but they don't normally think that of themselves. e.g. when they go to the bank, their teller is going to treat them like any other person. They are still humans!

However, if they are super famous, then it might be hard to get a reply from them because they probably get a lot of emails. No harm in trying though. Try to send relevant application materials. 

[DBear]

On 2016. 11. 2. at 5:09 AM, day_manderly said:

you shouldn't mention professors you haven't contacted as your potential advisors

@TakeruK what is your take on this, may I ask? This may differ based on school/ field but I know people who've gotten in without ever having contacted anyone... 

[TakeruK]

4 hours ago, DBear said:

@TakeruK what is your take on this, may I ask? This may differ based on school/ field but I know people who've gotten in without ever having contacted anyone... 

I think this does depend a lot on your field and your school as you say. I think it's a good idea to contact or to try to contact a professor before mentioning that you want to work with them. But I don't think it's an absolute rule that you should not mention a professor unless you have contacted them. 

There's also (at least) two ways to mention professors in a SOP, like I wrote above. If you say that you are interested in Prof X's work, that's not the same as saying you want Prof. X as your advisor, and I think if you are just pointing out connections between your interests and someone's work, you don't need to reach out to them beforehand.

That said, if you don't, you take a small risk that the person you mention isn't present any more or isn't working on that anymore. It's a small risk though, and it's probably not going to be an auto-reject if you are wrong about this.

[day_manderly]

17 hours ago, TakeruK said:

This wording you suggest is really awkward. As someone said, I wouldn't phrase it that way. Here's a sample of something one could write in a SOP. Let's assume that in earlier paragraphs, you already established your interest in the study of apple pie making:

I am excited for the opportunity to study Apple Pieology at University of Pielandia. I would be interested in working with Prof. Cool to study Crust Layering. I also anticipate collaborations with Prof. Great on the sugar-to-apple ratio. The research facilities at the University of Pielandia, particularly the Pie Recipe Library and the Automatic Filling Injector, would also be helpful.

---

Basically, I think you should mention professors in a way to achieve two goals: 1) you want to show that you have done some homework on the department and know who studies what and 2) you want to give the committee an easy way to "classify" you and basically suggest an answer to the question they are all thinking "Where would this applicant fit into our department?".

In the above example, I show a way to distinguish between who you want your advisor to be and who you will just collaborate with. But, you don't have to always distinguish this, you could just say that you are interested in Prof. Cool's Crust Layering work and Prof. Great's sugar-to-apple ratio work, without specifying that you want to work with one or the other.

Thank you so much for valuable advice!

 

[avflinsch]

19 hours ago, TakeruK said:

Basically, I think you should mention professors in a way to achieve two goals: 1) you want to show that you have done some homework on the department and know who studies what and 2) you want to give the committee an easy way to "classify" you and basically suggest an answer to the question they are all thinking "Where would this applicant fit into our department?".

 

My basic approach (based on advice from my LOR writers) is going to mention my particular area of interest and to show where it overlaps or parallels the current work being done by Professors Cool, Awesome, Famous and Great, without specifically attaching myself to anyone of them.

[DBear]

On 2016. 11. 3. at 11:21 AM, TakeruK said:

That said, if you don't, you take a small risk that the person you mention isn't present any more or isn't working on that anymore. It's a small risk though, and it's probably not going to be an auto-reject if you are wrong about this

Thank you!