Why British students join the Ivy League
Our brightest and best are being lured by the prestige, flexibility and finances of US colleges, reports Helen Kirwan-Taylor
At this time of year my Instagram feed fills up with pictures of tearful parents dropping their kids off at university. This would seem normal – if the location didn’t say USA. When my youngest headed to Yale four years ago, he was considered an adventurer. Since then, there has been a 31 per cent increase in British students applying to US colleges: 11,600 British students are now there, according to the Fulbright Commission, which fosters educational exchange between the UK and US. Up to half of the students at Westminster and St Paul’s apply – 41 students from the latter received offers this year.
That number is growing, thanks to the 600 American universities that offer generous financial scholarships to international students, covering not only the fees, room and board in full but also flights home, laptops and even phone bills. This would be worth in excess of £220,000 per student, says Rowena Boddington, director of advising and marketing at the Fulbright Commission. Its USA College Day – where 150 American universities, including Ivy League institutions, are represented – is held in London on Sept 29 and 30. Last year queues formed around the corner.
My son’s interest in America was the result of spending summers there – not to mention reading The Great Gatsby. He didn’t want to limit himself to one subject, as the English system stipulates. He is due to graduate next summer with a creative writing major.
“I see our children as the new colonials,” says journalist Deirdre Fernand, whose son Ben won a Hesburgh-Yusko scholarship worth several hundreds of thousands of pounds to Notre Dame, a second-tier college in Indiana with a top ranked football team and hefty endowment. “We used to put them on boats. Now we put them on planes and wave goodbye.”
Having spent a few years in the US herself, as the daughter of an academic, Fernand knew that American universities were generous. “Notre Dame has $10 billion to spend. That’s more than some of the Ivys,” she says. Ben is due to graduate next summer with a degree in finance and Spanish.
American universities are gaining ground rapidly among British students for several reasons. The first is financial: though Ivy League fees are eye-watering – Harvard costs $63,000 (£46,000) a year including room and board – they travel the world looking for talented students (who they lure with lucrative offers). The Sutton Trust US programme founded by Sir Peter Lampl has, over the past five years, sent more than
270 bright, British state school students on full financial scholarships to institutions including Yale, Harvard,
MIT and Princeton.
The other reason is level playing fields. Sir Peter’s decision to promote US university education is based partly on what he believes is an unfair system at Oxbridge (40-45 per cent of the student intake still comes from private schools, despite the fact that 93 per cent of British students attend state schools).
Ironically, the most privileged pupils in the country are drawn to the American system for the reverse reason. With growing talk of positive discrimination n against privately educated pupils hoping to secure a place at the top UK institutions, many are thinking about applying to a top university across the Atlantic, assuming, rightly or wrongly, that it will give them better odds than a place at Oxbridge. So, for both disadvantaged students and privately educated ones, an American degree is becoming an increasingly attractive prospect.
The less rigid structure of US undergraduate courses also appeals. “I like the flexibility of the four-year American programme,” Lampl says. “In Britain, [students] often end up getting degrees they don’t want because they can’t change.” The American degree system is a bit like a supermarket: after sampling some of the goods, you go to the till with your final selection. It’s this ability to try things (at no great risk) that allows students to change their minds. Allie Hexley, 22, a British student from Birmingham, studied at MIT with a double major in brain and cognitive sciences and physics, and American colleges let you sit the SATs a few times and take the highest score. Needs-blind admission means finances should not be a factor (check the website for scholarship programmes).
American colleges want kids who will fill their theatres and stadiums and write for their newspapers. Extra-curricular is critical.
The admissions officers in the US read applications carefully. Make yourself worth caring about.
This is considered the minimum; American admissions officers know a hedge-yourbetser (who thinks of American university as a backup) and will reject a chancer.
When asking your teachers to write a reference (part of the admissions process in most colleges), ask for enthusiasm. No hyperbole is too much. American colleges care what their graduates do when they leave. If you want to be president (of your country), say so. is now beginning graduate studies in neuroscience at Harvard as part of the Sutton Trust US programme.
“It may seem like you know what you want to study, and ultimately do with your life when you are 18 and have been forced to pick subjects to pursue at A-level, but in reality no 18-year-old knows. Having the opportunity to change your major as you go and try things you never would have otherwise tried is incredible,” she says.
American college education is also full-on. “My daughter has been astonished not just at the quality but also at the quantity of teaching at USC [University of Southern California],” says Neil Mendoza, chairman of the Landmark Trust, whose halfAmerican children both study in the US. “She has 14-15 hours of classes a week, as well as after-hours help.”
Recent research suggests that in the UK, economics students can receive as little as 26 hours of one-to-one tuition over a three-year course.
Phil Mooney, a 25-year-old banker from Belfast, turned down a place to study German at Oxford to go to Princeton. He wanted to “replicate the adventure” of his gap year, and Princeton also offered diversity: while majoring in German and politics, he also took classes in statistics, Middle Eastern history and still-life painting. “American college gives you a much broader view of the world,” he says.
“My life would have been much easier if I stayed at home: you can keep close to family and close to friends, and you are less likely to lose love over long distance. But you never explore, never push your own limits, and you’re emptier if you stay.”
There is a risk all parents take when their children choose to study abroad, however – they may not return. “It’s the first thing mothers ask,” says Fernand. “‘Are you worried he’ll settle in America?’ Not at all. Why would I be that selfish?”
I worry too, but this new “cognitive elite” of globally educated students will ultimately have the upper hand.
‘My life would have been easier if I’d studied in the UK, but you’re emptier if you stay’