<p>Question: My son was accepted by three colleges, and he has chosen the one he wants to attend. Are there samples somewhere of what to write the two schools he has decided not to attend? We would like to be as polite as possible and express thanks for the opportunities. It’s a breath [...]</p>
<p>say something along the lines of:
dear (the school, or dean of admissions, etc..) i would like to inform you that i am not going to be attending (the school's name). i am going to be attending (school's name he is going to be attending), but i appreciate the offer very much.
thank you very much,
(your son's name)</p>
<p>you do not need to offer an explanation why you did not choose their school.</p>
<p>When I got accepted and decided not to go. I told them that my I need to take several more courses before transfer and they told me that I will need to reapply for admission, and it was solved in the most polite way. In case, if your s decides to go to those schools he wont face any hard time with the admission committee. If he is a freshman,you can ask for a deferral of admission, I guess most of the state school does not accept defferral if you don't have a very decent reason.</p>
<p>May not be the most polite thing to do, but I think that so many people do it that it is the defacto standard --- don't reply to the offer by the 5/1 deadline, they will get the message.</p>
<p>I've said it before, I'll say it again - good manners reap good rewards. My daughter returned the notification cards to the colleges she was declining. In addition, she sent handwritten notes to two of the college reps with whom she had developed a relationship. Both colleges responded with offers to keep the admissions offer open for a certain length of time, and one even offered to keep her merit scholarship available. It was nice to have those options available in case things didn't work out with her selected college.</p>
<p>I would agree that showing a little class when declining offers is the best thing to do. We, too, heard that they would keep his application on file should he change his mind. One admissions department I thanked in an email for being extremely professional and pleasant, and got a return thank you in kind! There is a certain amount of anxiety involved in saying no thanks to a school that was friendly to you and maybe even offered you money. Being nice just helps you to feel better about it.</p>