How do you say goodbye to a school you’ve been accepted to but are not going to attend? I mean interviewers, student ambassadors, etc.
I know on the contract you can deny, but I’m not sure who to send thank you’s to, and what I should write in them. Any advice is appreciated!
I sent an email to the AO and also had my daughter send a note. Say that you are humbled by the acceptance, you really liked the school, but decided to go to another school - you can include where/why - for example, you thought it was a better fit at X school because they had x program/sport/opportunity that excited you. Doesn’t need to be long. Appreciative and polite.
Short and sweet: “Thank you for your offer of admission, which I was very excited to receive. Unfortunately, I must decline. Thank you again for your consideration and for the time you have spent with me.”
Send to the Director of Admissions and/or your main point of contact at the school.
I would also like to ask, we would like to say Thank you to the coaches who probably vouched for kiddo in the admissions process. Should we tell them before or after the AO? Does it matter?
We’d like coach to hear the no from us, not from the AO, or an automated notification.
Other than coaches who were interested in you and deserve a personal note everyone else is used to kids declining their acceptance. It is far less of a big deal to them than it is to you so short and sweet is the way to go.
I’ve just always erred on the side of a little more because I have multiple kids that have applied to same/will apply to some of the same schools!
This is so interesting to me. We had no idea what we were doing in this process. My daughter got into one of the three schools she applied to, and I am thinking maybe she didn’t get into the others because she didn’t connect with anyone to have sent a thank you. Besides the interviews, and watching zoom informationals with a hundred other people we didn’t speak to anyone. (She did follow up interviews with an email thank you, and reached out to teachers in her area of extracurricular interest-only one of whom replied). The school she got into, her dad and I were in work meetings during her interview so didn’t even meet the interviewer. Is it common to have spoken with multiple contacts enough to need to send thank you notes? I am now even more shocked she got in.
My daughter applied to two schools (one that her 2 older siblings attend and the other which I attended). There were kid and parent interviews, she wrote thank you emails to both interviewers. She has decided to attend my alma mater, so we wrote emails to her interviewer at the other school thanking them for the acceptance and explaining her choice before we formally declined in the portal. My youngest will likely apply to both plus others in a few years, so it’s important to us to keep the door open not knowing where he’d like to go…
I think you should thank any individuals that you were in touch with/who helped you. These could include an admissions officer, interviewers or alumni helpers. It’s always good form to show some brief appreciation to individuals who gave you their time. However, I don’t think you owe the institution itself anything. They haven’t done you a favour by considering your application.
My daughter went to the coaches first to tell them she’d be declining then waited a day and told the admissions offices. I don’t really know if it matters but that’s what felt right to her.
Some do, some don’t. We didn’t. Our son simply checked the box of the school he turned down and moved on, no need for explanations.
This.
While true, that is not what the OP asked. Assuming she sent thank yous along the way, other than clicking the decline button, no further contact is needed.
It is a nice touch to send a thank you to admissions and anyone that really helped you along like a coach upon declining. But everyone it the school you came in contact with does not need/want a further note saying, “TY but nvm.” 
@AnonMomof2 Most people aren’t athletic recruits, so often there isn’t a relationship (like a coach) that needs closure until maybe after admission is offered. This is especially true now that we didn’t have fall visits where the parents got to meet the AO’s more.
But – if a school has offered admission along with a nice merit scholarship or FA award, and then you attend some of their revisits, and then you get a little more plugged in and connected as you are considering options over a period of a few weeks of you and kiddo asking questions especially if debating among several offers – well then by the end of THAT, you might well have a quick note of thanks to write. Add to this picture that in non-covid times, you WOULD have met this AO in person most likely by visiting schools in the fall. (I didn’t interview most of my DD3’s zoom interviewers this year. I DID interview with ALL 12 of DD2’s school AO’s last year.)
So thinking back to last year: the school my daughter did NOT get into – I had zero sense of “needing closure,” as it were (apparently they agreed. ha!). The others though – we DID connect with more post-M10 once she had gotten in, and she was offered some great opportunities that felt like they deserved a thoughtful follow up beyond just a click-and-go-not-accepting. (If it helps: imagine if now, your daughter were to turn down the school where you are planning to go – you probably now wouldn’t just click a button and say SEE’YA after 3 weeks of them seeing you at revisits, etc…)
That said, short and sweet. this is part of the gig for the schools so we definitely take it more personally to say goodbye to them than they take it with us. (And, some schools were definitely less gracious about our farewell, which made me glad we hadn’t accepted, TBH.). A couple of schools were truly lovely in parting ways, and we were glad for that this year when DD3 out of the blue decided she wanted to apply!
@AnonMomof2 , your experience wasn’t unusual either. These folks are just doing their jobs, so if you got from your encounters what you needed, great - you didn’t add to their workload! Some applicants engage to show interest and be more memorable. It can work. Or not!
If you write, short and sweet is fine. It can be factual, as ski’s above is, or it can be more of "it was a really hard decision, made more so because we felt a connection with you, but I’ve decided to attend xyz. Thank you for everything. "
They expect to do this with many students every year. For you, it’s different!
I’d have no problem with informing the coach first so long as they weren’t going to try to change my mind.
I had the same thought. My daughter had a lot of interviews but other than that not too much contact.
I have heard college AOs talk about how leading up to application, they are everyone’s best buddy. When decisions come out, they become nobody or an enemy. Just saying that they know the game too. And the AOs rarely make the decision alone.
Please don’t feel like this would have changed a decision. Odds are against it.
Also remember, looking back at some threads here, that applicants can get really miffed if they contact an AO and don’t hear back. Many of the “dialogs” applicants are having are the AO dutifully answering emails, etc.
And as a last note on this… you’ll get to do it again for college soon enough. If your kid wants to make more of a connection in that process, the opportunity will be there!
At one school, my kid’s AO was really young. He did a wonderful job of keeping connected throughout the process and making sure that all of my kid’s questions were answered. After my kid declined at that school, I actually emailed the head of admissions at the school and told him what a great job the AO had done. I’m not suggesting anyone do this - I just feel its important to let bosses know when their employees are doing their jobs well.
We’re now going through a similar process with colleges. The application/admissions process there has been pretty impersonal but for the few schools that have reached out or sent special letters/emails, its tough to say goodbye without feeling bad.
@HMom16 We did the very same thing with one of our AOs. She was heads and shoulders above the rest and was the best ambassador for the school (especially during this time of no visits). We emailed her DOA and HOS and let them know how wonderful and impressive she was.
She responded with a thank you and “you don’t know how much I needed to hear this today”. It was very, very hard to say no to that school and every post on social media from them pulls a heart string, all because of how wonderful our AO was.