Thank you note--same or different messages to all three professors?

[mseph]

I did not get any of the decisions yet, and couple applications are yet to be submitted, but all the letters are submitted now. Hence I am planning to write a thank you note to them soon (and another one when all the decisions are out, of course. Maybe with a small gift then?).

 

But then, I noticed that the content of the thank-you note will be pretty much the same for all three.. I am really really really grateful for what they have done for me, but pretty much for the same thing and for the same reason. So the message will be very similar, if not same word for word. 

 

Is it a bad to do this? The reason why I am worried is that all my three letter writers were the professors in the same department. I know it's very unlikely, but what if they end up finding out that I wrote pretty much the same thing to them? Would they find it offensive? Please feel free to give me any feedback on this, whether it's based on what you are planning to do in the future or on past experience!

[have2thinkboutit]

When I wrote thank you notes to my letter writers the whole thanks-so-much-for-everything-you-have-done section was rather similar, but I made sure that every letter was still personalized. For me this was easy at I have a very good personal connection with my writers so I got a little something for them that matched their personality and simply wrote a line or two about that. They were all very happy with that.

Overall, I don't think you'd have to worry much about them comparing the notes. I think a heartfelt thank you is appreciated and even though the wording might be similar it doesn't take away from it that your other writers would receive a similar letter. They all know that they are one out of three and I'm sure they also know that you are grateful to each and every one of them.

I hope that helps

[rising_star]

I would definitely try to personalize it to each one. Yes, you're thanking them for the time they spent writing letters but, this also gives you a chance to thank them for other things (a class you enjoyed, reviewing your application materials, putting you in touch with an important person in the field, etc.). It's unlikely that they'll sit around and compare your thank-you letters side-by-side but it's still a good idea to personalize things.