Declining interviews

[prospectivegrad1]

Hey all,

I know people have been getting interviews recently--and possibly accepting these interview invites--but would it be appropriate to decline interviews at this time? The thing is, I have interviews at 4 schools, and all the interviews are one week after the other. I'm not particularly enthusiastic about all these schools, and so I'm tempted to decline 2 of them so I wouldn't be so tired from traveling and would have more time to recover and perform well on the interviews at schools I am enthusiastic about. But it seems a little too early to do this, and I am worried about declining too many interviews, screwing up the interviews I want, and being left empty-handed with no grad schools to attend.

Any advice on when to decline interviews? I am definitely expecting more interview invites.

 

 

 

[LadyScientist]

I think if you are to decline an interview, you should probably do it as soon as possible. I would either call or respond via email and politely say that you appreciate the program's interest in you, but will not be able to attend the interview, although you thank them for their time and consideration.

I am sure these program coordinators understand that students will not be able to attend all interview offers they receive for one reason or another. But as long as you are polite and respectful (as academia really is a small world, you don't want to step on anyone's toes) I don't see anything wrong with declining an offer or two. But, out of respect for the program that was considering you, I think it would be best to let them know as soon as possible if you really don't feel like you would want to attend the program anyways.

But congratulations on having so many interviews to choose from!

[prospectivegrad1]

44 minutes ago, LadyScientist said:

I think if you are to decline an interview, you should probably do it as soon as possible. I would either call or respond via email and politely say that you appreciate the program's interest in you, but will not be able to attend the interview, although you thank them for their time and consideration.

I am sure these program coordinators understand that students will not be able to attend all interview offers they receive for one reason or another. But as long as you are polite and respectful (as academia really is a small world, you don't want to step on anyone's toes) I don't see anything wrong with declining an offer or two. But, out of respect for the program that was considering you, I think it would be best to let them know as soon as possible if you really don't feel like you would want to attend the program anyways.

But congratulations on having so many interviews to choose from!

 

This is great advice -- thank you!