Offer rejection letter: include chosen school or not?

[Springisontheway]

We now know where DD will go in September 2015. We were lucky that DD got into more than one school; so we now want to let the other schools know we won't be taking up their offers asap.

We are grateful for all the offers received. We have a second DD coming up in a few years, and these schools could potentially be just right for her. We've written polite no thank-you-letters, but wonder if we should mention where she is going to go? If I were on the admissions team, I would probably like that information just to have an idea of who my competition is at the moment. But we don't want to come across as rude.

What would you do?

Tell them. If their marketing is up to much, they'll want to know and may get in touch to ask anyway. Not rude in anyway, shape or form to let them know.

I very much doubt they care... . They'll have a very good idea of which schools they're competing with.

Definitely tell them and also why, if you can do that politely. If they are on their game they'll contact you to ask anyway. They will be able to improve their marketing (they may offer something that wasn't made clear to you) and will not hold it against DD2 (if they do I wouldn't want to sent a DC there). Most schools cannot afford to be blasé about why people don't choose them and it's great that you're taking your refusal seriously.

I wrote a rejection letter but didn't mention which school we had accepted in case by age 7 we realised it wasn't for DD and wanted to try for the rejected school at 7+ - I doubt they would remember or care by that stage but didn't want to unnecessarily complicate things (over thinking, I know!). The rejected school is lovely and it was the commute that would was the deciding factor (we did mention this as the reason for rejection), as we have DS school drop off to consider. If all had been equal then it would have been a tough choice between the schools. They have yet to contact us about which school we chose...

Thank you for the responses.

It sounds like we should mention where she will be going. The balance of responses suggests that they might be interested to know because it helps them build a picture for their future marketing, or they won't be bothered one way or the other. In which case, we can't offend them by mentioning where she is going, and, by doing so, we might be offering useful data.

We liked all the schools, but a child can only go to one school, so now we need to respond quickly so they can potentially work through their waitlists.

A nice letter with or without that info is great, but if you delay and/or only send it by snail mail, this might cost other people deposits - if you also call or email, the schools can quickly issue offers to DC on their waiting lists.

Otherwise my suggestion is to offer them to share constructive feedback (ideas for them, impressions?), your school choice etc with the registrar (or other relevant staff) when convenient. Their priority this coming week is speed and acceptances.

Last year we rejected two by phone (with email follow-up with nice words). One school followed up by asking which school we chose, the other did not bother (or perhaps already knew - I suspect North London consortium might share this)

Yes NWgirls, we are going to send them via email for the sake of speed. We realise some families must be on tenterhooks. I don't know if it makes any difference to the wait lists...I suppose it depends on how much they over-offered in the first place! But it won't hurt for us to get a move on.

I'd feel presumptuous to offer to give them further feedback upon request. . She was fortunate to get the offers, but she, and we, aren't "all that and a bag of chips!" Iyswim

Great - and yes of course only offer feedback if you have something specific to suggest which you expect them to find helpful!

Letters sent. Thanks for the encouragement on such a petty issue!

Thanks for following through! Agree the content of the letter is a rather detailed point, but you proactively getting your rejections of several unwanted offers sent today will be appreciated by many families hoping desperately that waitlists will come through. And if you named the schools you would probably receive plenty of from various people!