HIGHER EDUCATION
...Studying for success in the UK & the US
“In US higher education, they focus their core curriculum around the liberal-arts approach,” he explains. “Even if a student has decided that they would like to study engineering, they will still be required to study a broad curriculum, which will involve, for example, a little bit of maths, philosophy, French and science. It is through the discovery of those classes that they start to find out for themselves their major area of interest. “So being undecided as a teenager in the US – applying undeclared – does not pose the same problems as it can in the UK. It’s a different mindset in the US.”
The global appeal of studying in the US is growing
by the day, and there are now more international students studying in US colleges than ever before – almost one million at the last count, according to US organisation the Institute of International Education. And with more than 4,000 universities and colleges in the US, compared with just over 150 in the UK, there is an enormous variety of institutions and courses to choose from.
Offering the ability to study a broad curriculum for the first two years and to defer the choice of a major area of study until much later than in the UK, studying stateside can be an enticing prospect for aspiring undergraduates. Studying as an overseas student in the US has also
been shown to enhance a student’s CV when it comes to applying for a job. According to a Council for Industry and Higher Education (CIHE) survey, one in three employers values international study experience when reviewing job applications, and 65 per cent of employers prefer applicants with overseas work experience.
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DIFFERENCES BETWEEN UK AND US COLLEGE APPLICATION But, says Daniel de Witt, students need to make a very clear distinction between the different elements of applying to a UK and a US university. “There are very different sets of expectations in the US,” he says.
a conditional
“In the UK, it is very black and white: students receive offer based on a
set of predicted grades
accompanied by brief biographical information and a short personal statement not exceeding 4,000 characters. There’s not much to it, and it can be relatively formulaic. If the student gets the grades, they go to that university. “Because the ethos behind a US undergraduate degree is still based on the liberal arts, and due to its multifaceted, multidisciplinary education, there is a lot more data that students can include in their applications.” While he agrees that academic performance will always be at the core of any decision, Mr de Witt explains that there is space to bring in a large amount of the student’s character to a US university application.
In the UK, students apply for up to five different university courses through the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS), an online system with a database of courses and entry requirements that processes UK university applications. In comparison with this process, applying to US colleges can be a lengthy and strenuous process, he says, with much more direct communication and collaboration with the colleges themselves.
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