to think it's a bit mean to not tell children whether or not they've been successful?

[Thefifthbeatle]

DD (7) is very musical. She recently auditioned to become a chorister at the cathedral in our city. I wasn't sure whether it was a good idea for a 7 year old to be doing auditions - it seemed like quite a lot of pressure - but a note came home from school about it, so we took her along to the open day and she absolutely loved it, and we went ahead with it.

The audition was almost three weeks ago; we haven't heard anything yet. One of DD's friends heard in the middle of last week that she has been offered a place, so it seems likely that DD hasn't. I wondered whether perhaps an email had been lost along the way somewhere, so emailed them a couple of days ago to check, but they are not responding. I now don't know what to say to DD. The evidence suggests that she hasn't got a place, and although we've tried very hard to keep everything very casual, she has been asking every day whether they've decided yet, and is going to be pretty upset, because she really wanted to do it. Do we wait a week to check whether they do eventually come back to us to confirm? If they don't respond, do we wait 2 weeks? 3?

I can't help feeling that it's a bit mean to put 7 year olds in this position; they aren't adults, applying for jobs. They are still pretty young kids and it isn't really fair to not tell them at all whether or not they've got in, and just leave us to decide when the level of rudeness involved is so great that they must have not got a place. Is it just me? And in this situation, how long would you wait before deciding that the answer must be no, and telling your DC?

It is really bad manners.
They need to reply with positive feedback.
I'd leave them some feedback on the lack of consideration or manners showing.

Yes it's rude but I think your perspective on this is a bit skewed if it's keeping you awake at night

It is rude not to say offer will be made on X date so if you've not heard by then please assume that you were unsuccessful.

Given all the difficulties at present over social distancing etc they may well be conducting auditions over a number of weeks. They can't tell her she's in until all have been heard, surely?

Three weeks is not particularly long to hear from auditions IME, but they should have given a clear date when you would hear from them.

Auditions for 7yos are usually fine- they're far less anxious and self conscious usually than older children.

YANBU if they don't contact you but I would be patient.

As PPs have said, your DD might be on a waiting list and they may be waiting to hear back from the first 5 or they might have selected some candidates but want to call others back for a second audition. It's been a bank holiday and half term so that might be delaying acceptances. The person you emailed might be on holiday.

I think I would give it until the end of next week before chasing them. I would tell your DD that it will probably take a few more weeks to find out so hopefully she puts it out of her mind. I would also have a chat with her to prepare her that she might not get a place this time eg tell her how amazing she is to have been selected to audition but there are so few places they can't take everyone even if they wanted to. Maybe there are other opportunities you could suggest to give her something to look forward to? Perhaps she might like to try for the National Children's Choir when she is 9?

It’s been 8 days? I would be patient.

But as someone whose son has auditioned for various music things since about age 7 (he plays violin and piano at a reasonably high level) and been accepted for various things and rejected for others, if you want to do this, then get ready for knock backs. We are always VERY matter of fact about it. And it’s been mostly fine.

Honestly, I would just tell her that it doesn’t appear that she got in. You think she hasn’t and that is probably the case. Then if she does get in you can say that it looks like you were wrong.

At this point you are kind of doing the same thing to her as the choir is doing.

It's bad manners.

I am unimpressed when employers can't be bothered to let job applicants know they've been unsuccessful. I think it's even more inconsiderate to leave children hoping against hope.

Especially these days. After all, how damn difficult is it to type an email saying: "Dear insert name, I am sorry to inform you your application was unsuccessful. Yours sincerely, not so rude organisation."

I don’t want to state the obvious, but have you checked your spam?

I embarrassed myself quite a lot recently when I didn’t check it. Of course the really important email had ended up in there!

It's bad we are accepting this as the norm for adults - it's dreadful for 7 year olds. Lesson learned - ask for feedback methods to be clarified before you leave in future. I think I would tell her it looks like she was unsuccessful now - she might as well deal with it now than after another week of hoping. If an offer does come along 🥳

And yes re spam, I was complaining about not receiving invites to meetings and they were all in junk mail - red face.

I'd tell her you don't think she's got in, let her down gently instead of continuing to hang onto her hopes.
She might have already heard from friends who did get in too.

Yanbu. It is rude and also mean.

How awful, it's not hard to send a nice, complimentary rejection letter of email "we very much enjoyed listening to your singing which was of a very high quality, unfortunately . . . etc"

Having said that I have recently been involved with a couple of enterprises involving people filling out their email addresses on to forms and a very high proportion are illegible. How's your handwriting OP?

So sorry to read this, I do wonder at people sometimes. Years ago my daughter auditioned for the school play, having been in every single one up until then which involved both evening and weekend rehearsals. She knew she wouldn't get an acting part, and auditioned for the dancing, she had danced in other productions.

She and a friend found out late afternoon on the last day of term they hadn't been chosen, the rest of the 'gang' had. I was so angry I phoned the Head of English/Drama and asked him to email her with feedback - and suggested he might also like to do it for her friend. He was taken aback but agreed to do it. She's twenty five now and I've never told her that I rang him, but I hope it made him think carefully of the effect his decisions had on the enthusiastic young people who worked so hard on 'his' productions.

Maybe they had a bit of a hiccup with mailmerge for sending out the "don't call us we'll call you" emails?? Easily done, sometimes not all the emails send correctly x

@Thefifthbeatle

OhSayWhat, thank you, yes - I am already awake at night feeling really terrible about it.

Even if you think my parenting was rubbish, my question wasn't whether it was reasonable to have gone for the audition, but whether it was reasonable to expect them to have let us know the outcome, either way. To be absolutely honest, I didn't predict that they would ever be so rude, so I hadn't considered this as an outcome I'd have to help her deal with.

OK, OP, this over-reaction to a PP's post and your violent reaction to a (possibly) unsuccessful audition is pretty telling. @OhSayWhat simply said that when you put a child forward for this kind of process, you both need to consider their resilience and how you will help them manage dealing with rejection (or indeed success), or, as you are having to deal with, the vagaries and delays of a large organisation which doesn't treat you or a young child with the kind of attentiveness you would like. No one is attacking your parenting.

It is rude, there maybe a reason for it or maybe not. In future perhaps clarify timeframes at the auditions.
I think it is good for kids to try stuff and deal with both success and rejection, easier to learn to shrug things off from an early age when stuff isnt as important so you know how yo deal with the feelings when you are older.

A violent overreaction? Catch yourself on.

I suspect the delay is down to school holidays tbh.

If they genuinely haven't contacted you yet, I think it shows a lack of awareness about how to treat 7 year olds and would see it as a narrow escape tbh. I would tell your DD that she is on the reserve list and you have to wait for other people to come back from their holidays before you know for sure what is happening. As she is so keen I think starting the process of letting her down gently would be a good idea.

All that said... I hope there is an acceptance sitting in your junk folder!

I would tell your DD that she is on the reserve list and you have to wait for other people to come back from their holidays before you know for sure what is happening.

How would that help??? You know you can be honest with 7 year olds. Sooner she learns about how the world works the better imo.

It is so rude when people do this - as though their time is so very important but not yours. However, I do think it is up to you to manage your daughter's expectations if you are going to take her to auditions. Being kept awake at night worrying about it does seem a rather extreme reaction.

Yes, it's rude not to send a polite message to each who auditioned.

Ring them up and ask if they might be in need of a donation.

@WeAreTheHeroes

A violent overreaction? Catch yourself on.

I suspect the delay is down to school holidays tbh.

Yes. A violent overreaction. The OP has said she's staying awake at night 'feeling terrible about it', and her response to a perfectly sensible post from someone else was perceiving criticism of her parenting that simply hadn't been made at all.

The delay isn't great, obviously, and of course it's difficult to see your young child deal with rejection.

@Thefifthbeatle

PigGondola, I thought that too, but it's now been 8 days since those offers were sent out, and there were only going to be 5 offers made, so I'd be a bit surprised if they hadn't heard back from those parents. They're pretty sought-after places...

But that's 8 days including the bank holiday weekend and several days of school holiday. I bet they don't have all the responses back yet.

I agree it's rude not to respond to everyone, but it's not yet been 3 weeks since the audition which I think is an entirely acceptable time frame not to have got back to everyone yet.
If you didn't know anyone that had got in, would you be chomping at the bit in the same way?