When February rolls around and you hear back from the schools you’ve applied to you’ll be that much further down the road to your destination. Here is a road map to use as you approach the final stretch to the right-fit school for your child and family.

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WHEN?

You’ll hear back from schools you applied to at some point in February, depending on their specific admissions timeline. All schools that are members of ISAAGNY operate on a standardized timeline that can be found on the ISAAGNY website.

In general, kindergarten students hear back first, in early February. The next several weeks bring decisions regarding elementary, middle and high school students. Nursery/pre-K families receive news last, at the end of February.

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HOW?

Every school will send you an email letting you know that admissions decisions are now available. Some schools may share their decision within the email, while others will direct you to log in to your application portal (Ravenna, or a school-specific portal) for their decision.

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WHAT?

Independent schools offer three options for an admissions decision:

• Accepted: Straightforward - you were accepted! Details about financial information, deposit timelines, and more will follow soon.
• Rejected: Straightforward, but unfortunate - you were not accepted. Try to remember that school is a fit to find, not a contest to win. It is totally typical to receive at least one rejection in this highly competitive process. If your child is old enough to have taken an active role in applications, use this as a learning opportunity to acknowledge and manage feelings, explore resilience, and accept the reality that the rejection does not define them.
• Waitlisted: The least straightforward, and usually most stressful, type of decision to receive. Even though the news can feel like a defeat – you still have a chance of gaining admission. A waitlist offer means that the admissions team would love to accept your child into the school, but there isn’t room at this point.

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WAITLISTED, NOW WHAT?

Most movement on the waitlist will happen in the weeks immediately following the initial decision notification, because some families will give up their spots for spots in other schools. Because this process moves quickly, you need to move through the following steps just as quickly:

• Decide whether you want to stay on the waitlist. Compare all of your offers and assess whether your waitlisted school is your top choice, or if you’d rather choose a different school that offered acceptance.
• Call the waitlisted school as soon as possible to tell them whether you want to remain on the waitlist or not. If you do, you want to register your interest ASAP so you have a better chance of ultimate acceptance – ideally within a week of receiving your decision, though the sooner the better. If you don’t want to stay on the list, let your spot go ASAP so another family can benefit from it.
• If you are waitlisted at a school that is your first choice, when you call to tell them to keep you on the waitlist tell them that you will 100% accept a spot if offered. Schools try to prioritize waitlisted families who have expressed definite interest over waitlisted families that seem indifferent or have not gotten in touch.

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HOW DO WE DECIDE?

As we’ve discussed in earlier newsletters and blogs, deciding on what is “the right school” for your child involves a number of factors including school community, pedagogy, your child’s learning style, location, class size, specific course offerings, and breadth of extracurricular choices. In addition to these considerations, take time to review all of the interactions you’ve had with all of the schools in the admissions process and weigh what you learned and how you felt. Sometimes, a simple pro/con list can help!

Schools typically offer re-visit days alongside or shortly thereafter your acceptance offer, giving you another opportunity to put yourself inside a school and ask more questions in order to better discern whether you can imagine your child thriving there.

Making a final decision can be tough – but you can do it based on what you know about your child, your family, and the schools in question. Above all, remember that kids are resilient, and their long-term success and happiness does not rest solely upon this single decision alone. Chances are you are deciding between a number of excellent schools – each of which will serve as an excellent partner in raising your child!