Should I follow up on my admission status if I have a deadline to respond to a competing offer?

Question

I've applied to two engineering research masters programs and contacted potential supervisors for each one.

For my first choice program, the supervisor I contacted has expressed that he would be happy to supervise me, and my understanding is that he is going to ask the university to send me an admission letter soon. It has been almost two weeks since then and I have not received anything yet.

I received an offer from my second choice program last week and the deadline to respond is in about two weeks.

While it seems likely that I will get accepted to my first choice program, I am hesitant to reject the offer from my second choice program before having an offer from my first choice, just in case the professor changes his mind or the funding is not as good as I had hoped.

Would it be frowned upon to send a polite follow up email to my first choice prof, letting him know of the deadline for the other offer and asking for a status update? I don't want to come across as annoying or pestering.

Thanks for your help.

Answer 1

Yes you can ask for an update and an estimate of the time to completion. You can say that there is another offer that has a deadline. You probably should say that the one you are writing about would be your first choice.

You can ask if there are any potential issues or whether you should just relax. I suspect you will get enough information (hopefully happy information) to guide you further.

But you don't need to make important decisions in the dark.