Degrees At US Universities

[Leeds2]

I have read a lot of artcles recently about the pros and cons of British students doing their degrees at universities in the States.

Has anyone's child done this, or is going through the application process now? Can anyone recommend a book and/or website that sets out what you need to know? Did your child's school help with their application, or did you have to do all the research yourself?

Lurking as DS1 saw article in last week's Daily Telegraph and reckons he wants to go to the US. Lots of scholarships available apparently.
I was kind of hoping he'd forget from a purely selfish motherly point of view but DH says think of the saving in fees.......

I think if you go to an Ivy League University in the US it would be a fantastic experience but I'm not sure how a degree from one of the state universities would be received by UK employers.

DD1 is in her third year at university and is spending a year studying in the US as part of a UK degree, she isn't at an Ivy League university and it is so much easier than studying in the UK. She has written an one essay so far since august and all her tests have been multiple choice or short amounts of text. She is currently taking all senior courses and getting better scores than the postgraduates on the course! She says the content is of a similar standard to what she studies in the UK but the way it is examined is much less rigorous. She is 2:1 level in the UK but regularly gets 100% in the US.

It has been a great experience and the major difference is the flexibility of modules. DD1 is studying biology and has been able to take philosophy and human anatomy that would just not be available in a UK degree. But from an academic point of view I would be a bit wary.

I think it is quite an interesting idea, but have no knowledge of the various US universities so wouldn't really know how to "rank" them. Ideally, if DD decided to pursue this idea, I would prefer her to go to a "good" uni with a decent qualification at the end of it. But I also know that if I was interviewing a British candidate for a job, I would be hugely impressed by the fact that they had been motivated enough to do something which was a little out of the ordinary.

Webwiz, does your DD's English (?) uni allow students on all its courses to spend a year in the States, or is it specific to the biology dept? It's a great experience for her. I would love my DD to do something similar.

You need to be well organised as they need to take American SATS exams well in advance of the normal application date. The Fulbright Commission run very helpful days www.fulbright.co.uk/news-events/usa-study-events/usa-college-day

There are fees for the SATS exams and fees for each university application. Scholarships won't cover the full costs at most universities. There are restrictions on students working off campus. While a few places are beginning to offer 3 year courses and English A levels may offer exemption from some first year courses you should budget for 4 years of study. Outside the IVY league English employers may not be familiar with colleges.

There are very few universities offering needs blind admission but it is a good choice for the very brightest British students. You may remember Laura Spence went to Harvard on a full scholarship when turned down by Oxford. However I seriously doubt that many state schools would offer any support and many of those who consider it drop the idea when they learn more about it.

At the DC school, inceasingly the students are opting for Ivy League instead of Oxbridge when they have offers on both. Annoying, as we had it mind for our DC when it was less well known - now it has become main stream much more competition

Leeds2 the year studying abroad is offered by most of the faculties at the university and by lots of other universities as well. You can apply through UCAS for courses with a year abroad or do what DD1 did and sign up after a talk in her first year. She had to fill in an application form and provide a personal statement to the US university but didn't have to go through the full US process as she is an exchange student.

There are various extra costs such as visas (interview at the American Embassy needed) and health insurance (which is ridiculously expensive) but for this year she pays half tuition fees to her UK university and they pay her US tuition fees.

She is very far away though (West Coast of America) but that is ok because she is in her third year and used to being away from home. It was still very nerve wracking for us for the first month while she got settled in so I can't imagine sending an 18 year old who hasn't lived away from home that far away!

The whole culture at a US university is very different to a UK one - they are much bigger for a start and because there isn't a common course that everyone is following it can be difficult to make friends with others doing your subject. Also there is the no drinking for under 21s thing which means that there is a very different social life - no university bar, no freshers week. DD1's major complaint though is that you can't buy decent cheese!!

Quite like the idea of no alcohol ........... (remembering back to own freshers' week!!)

What are the Ivy League universities? Sorry if that is an obvious question, but beyond harvard and Yale I really don't know.

And thanks for the Fulbright link, Ellisbell, I will have a look. I wanted somewhere recommended for my first look!

Ivy league universities here: collegeapps.about.com/od/choosingacollege/tp/ivy-league-schools.htm

Being unable to legally buy alcohol is not the same as no alcohol! DD1 went to "Welcome back to college" event in her first few weeks in the US and the freshman all arrived absolutely plastered because there was no opportunity to buy alcohol during the evening. DD1 said all the international students were shocked by the behaviour of the US students. It must have been bad if DD1 was shocked!

Aahh .........

I think if you go to an Ivy League University in the US it would be a fantastic experience but I'm not sure how a degree from one of the state universities would be received by UK employers.

Between the Ivy Leagues and the state universities, you have got hundreds of other private universities which are highly regarded throughout the world.

Yet having said that, there are many state universities that are world renowned, such as the University of California system, institutions like UCLA and Berkeley (also known as Cal).

In the Times Higher Education 'World University Rankings', Berkeley is ranked #9, there are only two Ivies above it (Harvard at #=2 and Princeton at #5).

The 'World Rankings' of the all the Ivies are: Harvard #=2, Princeton #5, Yale #11, Columbia #12, Penn #16, Cornell #20, Brown #49, Dartmouth #90

Taking into account the lowest ranking Ivy, these are all the non-Ivy colleges that finish above Dartmouth in these rankings (with their ranking in brackets):

California Institute of Technology (1), Stanford (=2), MIT (7), Chicago (9), University of California, Berkeley (10), University of California, Los Angeles [AKA UCLA] (13), Johns Hopkins (14), Michigan (18), Carnegie Mellon (21), Duke (22), Georgia Institute of Technology (24), Washington (25), Northwestern (26), Wisconsin-Madison (27), Texas at Austin (29), Illinois at Urbana Champaign (31), University of California, San Diego (33), University of California, Santa Barbara (35), University of California, Davis (38), Washington University at St Louis (41), Minnesota (42), North Carolina at Chapel Hill (43), New York University (44), Penn State (51), Boston University (54), University of Southern California (55), Ohio State (57), Pittsburgh (59), UMass (64), Valderbilt (70), Rice (72), Emory (75), University of Colorado at Boulder (77), Tufts (78), University of Rochester (=81), Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (=81), University of California, (86) and Notre Dame (89).

As an American, I would recommend any of the above colleges, all of which would offer any student (from home or abroad) an excellent education and an incredible experience.

There is life beyond the Ivy League. The Ivy League is made up of just eight colleges, so clearly the majority of US students go to non-Ivies, and they seem to do OK on the whole.

It makes me laugh that people here think the Ivy League is the be all and end all. That used to be the attitude back home in the States, but that has changed in recent years, which is why some of the "lesser" Ivies have started to slip down rankings and have been replaced by other colleges.

And no, I have nothing against the Ivy League, I am a proud Columbia alumni. In fact I met my English husband at Columbia, as he had chosen to study in the US, so choosing to attend there was one of the best decisions I've ever made. I'll be honest though, I had another college in mind for the subject I wanted to major in (which at the time was only available in about 20 colleges, but is now more widely available), however it also happened to be the college that my mom was (well still is) a professor at, in the very subject I planned to read. Therefore, I opted for Columbia, as there is no way I could have avoided not having my mom teach some of my classes at the other college!

I just think it's important for people to realize, there are dozens of fine colleges back in the States, which are not Ivies.

NB: One of my younger siblings has just been accepted at Stanford, his dream college, and that's where he'll attend. This is despite the fact he has also received offers from Harvard, Yale, Columbia and Princeton. In the past, people would balk at someone turning down offers from the Ivies, but Stanford (dubbed a "new Ivy" by some) is so highly regarded these days, no-one has blinked at my brother's decision!

Oops - the college ranked #86 is University of California, Irvine, I forgot to the add the Irvine bit!

I meant for recognition by UK employers ButterPecanMuffin - they just don't know enough to judge the value of degrees from other US universities. I have only just got my head round what a reasonable grade point average and how it works.

I think it will be valuable to DD that she's been to a US university in addition to her UK studies but I doubt any UK employers will have a clue where it appears in any rankings.

Then UK employers need to start getting to grips with it, because if they think all Ivies are the academic elite, I'm afraid they're wrong.

Less value is placed on a degree from one of the "lesser Ivies" these days, then one from perhaps, Stanford or Johns Hopkins.

I appreciate that the UK needs time to catch up with the fact that not all the Ivies are as "elite" these days, as perhaps they once were, but I'd hate for that to put off students from the UK studying at one of the other fine colleges the US has to offer.

I suspect that given the fact the numbers of UK students studying back home is rising ever year, UK employers will start to 'swot up' themselves, on the US system.

My mom is a prof at U Chicago, and until a few years ago, she'd only ever taught a handful of British students. Now she has several in each class!

students are put off studying at other universities by the high cost of living in America, the inability to work off campus. and the cost of application. Generally there are very few bursaries for overseas students and those that are available go nowhere near meeting the cost. Hence you get either applications to needs blind universities or those who want to work in America or both. It's also a good option for someone with broad interests who doesn't want the narrow focus of British degrees.

Anyone who goes to the Fulbright open day will receive a lot of e-mails from American universities, some mentioning their scholarships.

There are several universities offering a year abroad and that can be appealing to an employer.

The application fee is often waived if an applicant's parents are on low incomes.

My ds did a year in Canada as part of his UK degree. If you do it this way you usually pay your fees to the UK insitution (and sometimes only half fees) so it is fairly cheap way to get experience of an overseas university.

Just a quick plug for Dartmouth - although in your list you say it was 90th - it was ranked by US News and World Report generally considered the ranking of note on US Universities as First for Undergraduate Education. Dartmouth is the smallest of the Ivies (around 4,500) undergraduates. It has very few graduate schools - Tuck for business, A medical school, an Engineering school all of which are highly regarded. The skew in rankings comes from the size of the College (it's not a University). Many of the University rankings look for the range of research and graduate programmes that Dartmouth doesn't have. It's probably worth mentioning that the size of the endowment versus relative to the size of student body makes it very well funded. The competition to get in is extremely fierce because of its size. Its location is spectacular and the facilities and teaching are among the best in the Ivy League. ButterPecanMuffin is correct however in that there are many many great universities in the US that are not in the Ivies since the Ivy League was really simply a construct to play sports.

ButterPecanMuffin isn't that only for American students, not international?

The SATS exams start ridiculously early in the morning and are held in only a few places, usually public schools. They get booked up well before the closing date. If your child is at state school you are probably facing either overnight accommodation or a night journey, that is not desirable given the length of the exam. They would also benefit from practice sessions. It's not a cheap process.

Most UK uni's offer the opportunity to do an ERASMUS placement, though it's not guaranteed, it depends on how well they are performing as a student.

I must admit that the US qualifications don't compare fantastically with UK, from the aspect of NARIC, which is an organisation that maintains a database that compares UK qualifications to those outside the UK. I've seen quite a few transcripts for three year degrees that have compared to a HND in breadth of knowledge. So it tends to be the four year degrees that are equivalent to a UK Degree [but not UK Honours Degree's] we had quite a few students come from the US and 'top-up' their degree to a UK Honours degree before being employable or progressing to post-graduate study [Masters, PGCE's etc]

UK schooling is over 13 years, US over 12, so the first year of a degree in the US is an equivalent level of study to A level's. The High School Graduation Diploma is the equivalent level to UK GCSE's. It's only if they take AP's/ACT's/SAT's that they are considered almost comparable, where in the UK you could enter Uni with 2 AL and 1 ASL you'd need SAT scores of a minimum of 600 in Critical Reading/Maths and Writing [equivalent grade is a C at A level] the US national average for these are between 450-500, in addition each Uni sets a ACT/AP subject requirement too.

Employers can access NARIC for a fee, but not all of them will. It's bad enough trying to explain a HND to some of my past employers. I ended up having to do the research and provide it to them.

I was an admissions officer for a 'new' Uni and our standards were usually 240 UCAS points for our degree courses.

I'm getting an impression that degree study is different in the US.
DS is very focussed on studying Physics, he most definitely doesn't want a broad subject focus, if the first year is equivalent to our A level is it possible to skip that? Could anyone please explain it to me a little more? Or point me somewhere that does?

They won't let them skip it as it's an integral part of the course, for example it might be a core part of the program that they would need to have studied before skipping to the next level. The Level is the same but it doesn't mean the content it.

If it were up to me I'd send DD to Australia, the schooling system over there is ahead of us. Though in most areas they don't start school til they are 6, when they get to the qualifications they take at 16 they are the same level as A level, the qualifications they take at 18 are the same level as a HNC/CertHE or equivalent to the first year of a degree. Unfortunately it is unlikley they'd come back to the UK after enjoying life out there :) [my cousins went out at 12 and 14 and were put in classes 2 years lower as their schooling wasn't up to scratch, their parents came back but they are still out there]

If you want to be a specialist then you are probably not best going to a US uni, as the aim is for a broad based education. However if you are generally interested in learning, then they can be a very good option.

Can't comment on the fianancial pro's and con's of USA vs UK, but read this - World Uni Rankings; out of the top 10, 7 are in the USA

financial duh

World rankings are usually biased to the US. The lists are usually mainly US, with some UK, and a very few of any other country. You need to look at how they choose who to include carefully.