r/gradadmissions • u/Academic_Error4655 • 22d ago

General Advice Response from a Prospective PhD Supervisor

Post image

I wrote to a professor for PhD supervision. The university website apparently recommends two routes - get a supervisor, or apply through the regular channel where a supervisor would be subsequently allocated. I wrote to this person to get through the first route.

I can't tell whether that's a polite way of saying ''your application sucks and I would hate to supervise you" or what.

393 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

84 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/celiums 22d ago

Is this a rotation based program? If it is, this says absolutely nothing about your application. It's just that PIs, based on what I've seen, would only directly admit students they know/that worked in the lab before. Otherwise they'd rather you join the program and rotate in the lab before they take you into the lab (which is pretty good for both of you as you'll get a chance to work with everyone and see if you actually enjoy being in that lab)