What should a Rejection letter look like?

<p>I was just looking over the "Best/Worst Admissions/Rejection Letters" thread and I was thinking, what content, phrasing, font, letterhead, etc, would make a rejection just a bit more bearable?</p>

<p>I mean acceptance letters can be as creative as they want and while there are some things that can make them better (some schools do personalized/ handwritten notes by admissions people, MIT send you a giant tube if you get in EA, etc) you get diminishing returns since if you got into a school you really wanted to go to you are already in a state of elation so it's hard to feel any better, and if you didn't care about that school, there's little they could say in the acceptance letter that would make the decision any more significant.</p>

<p>On the other hand, rejection letters kind of are a big deal from what I can see. Getting rejected from anywhere hurts, whether its because you were convinced you were going to go there for the next four years, your pride is hurt because you were sure you could get into that school, or even if you never expected to get into that "reach" school, you still clung to that hope. Regardless, when reading the letter there's a lot of room to add insult to injury (or perhaps just insult to insult) but I feel like there can be room to leave you feeling not quite as bad as you could be feeling.</p>

<p>So, yeah. What exactly would you like to see in a rejection letter? Maybe they could stay away from the overused line "Thank you for applying... there was a large number of qualified applicants, etc."
Personally I'd like them to send be a chocolate with the rejection letter or maybe have a local alumni go around hand delivering rejections while offering a hug to those who need it.</p>

<p>It’s not really about the letter. It’s really about the feelings of the person receiving it…</p>

<p>They don’t care if rejectees are hurt. However, they care about yield.</p>

<p>Honestly, there’s not much they can say that’s going to improve my mood after a rejection.</p>

<p>Actually, if they sent me an envelope with a big “NO!” stamped on the outside, it might take the sting away by making me laugh.</p>

<p>The odds of having an alumni hand-deliver the rejections are low, mostly because most people don’t fancy getting punched in the face/having strangers sob hysterically on their shirt. :/</p>

<p>I dunno. I guess some chocolate would make me feel better.</p>

<p>I’d expect all rejections letters to make it blatantly clear within the first few words that you’ve been rejected- NEVER after the first sentence. That’s pretty much it.</p>