What’s so special about the US?

<aside> 💡 60% of the world’s top 50 universities are located in the U.S.

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<aside> ❗ There is no difference in academic quality within the top 10 institutions. There is no academic difference between the University of Chicago and Harvard - one has simply been in the movies more. The same goes for the next 20, then for the next 30. Like, Vanderbilt is the same as Dartmouth. You didn’t even know two of those existed, did you? But their students & alums do similarly excellent things.

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Campus/Community Feel

US colleges tend to be built like small towns. At US unis you feel much more at home, campuses are usually self-serving. The architecture tends to be something you’d want to spend more time around. US colleges guarantee housing & food. US college campuses tend to be more bustling due to a lot of these reasons.
Sports: The US has the best, most extensive program for Student-Athletes in the world. Want to pursue your Volleyball dreams but also really want to pursue your interests in History? Or to just want to have a back-up plan?.. You can do that. In the UK this is a nightmare, you have to choose between two lives or just suffer. The US merges them and puts mechanisms in place to make the Student-Athlete life easier. For example, free tutoring is provided for athletes as well as early class registration. Colleges run 20+ varsity sports and offer a wide variety of intramural (against peers in the same college) sports as well. E.g. fencing, squash, women's basketball

College football.

Columbia’s main campus in the Spring

Much broader academic plate.

Yum. American Unis' philosophy is to make you a ‘well-rounded’ student. The US college path exposes you to a broad range of subjects, whatever you choose to study. As an Engineer, I took a Nigerian Film class, Art History, and Football. Other classes I’ve taken at CU include: Fashion, Soca & Dancehall, African American Studies, and Business School classes (as an undergrad). 'Financial Engineering', my current course, doesn't exist in the UK.

Harvard Computer Science class

Much more flexibility with classes, too.

Uni is America is modular - you can take classes for your course generally whenever you want and in whatever combination. Take that Spanish class now or next year. People I know underloaded semesters to do useful part-time internships or to have more free time to explore opportunities in the new country.

SpaceX, the first privately-owned business to achieve spaceflight

Of all English-speaking countries the US pays the most

America is ahead of the curve

The United States is one of the major innovation hubs in the world. All the most impactful global finance and technology companies were founded in the US - this makes for a richer job market. Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, Blackstone, Google, OpenAI. The US is always doing things 4-5 years before the UK, it’s kind of crazy. 1 million international students flock to the US every year to take advantage of the opportunities and add to the culture and innovation; the cycle perpetuates..

Higher paid jobs

The US pays up to 2-3 times more for the same role in the UK across STEM & business jobs, like finance, technology, and consulting. If you study in the US, you’re granted work permission in the States. I took advantage of this - it helped my career and I enjoyed a lot.

You can study for free

Or at a seriously reduced cost. American unis are rich so can afford to pay for your education. I’m going to university for free. AND getting spending money on top.

Sports is just one of the ways US colleges foster a stronger community feel than British unis. Americans have more pride in their college than Brits. US unis foster community much better, some unis boasting up to 500 clubs.

Double majoring, minors

You can study Data Science and Human Rights at the same time. You can study Physics and African-American studies at the same time. You can major in Sustainable Development and minor in Data Science.

This also means you can generally study any subject you can think of. And if you can't, the college can organize for you to take the course at another local college - they're called consortiums, here's the coolest one in California.

You’re more than your grades.

You don’t need straight As in A level to get into Stanford (but it does generally need to be high). You can get AAA and still get in! You just need to be excellent in another area, like getting really prestigious awards. The US admissions process is holistic. This means more parts of the application decide whether you get in, as opposed to just grades, like in the UK. Things like the low-funded school you go to, your extra-curricular activities, and your awards are considered. It's not like in the UK where getting AAA instead of AAA will mean you lose your place at Oxford.

Beautiful Campuses

They’ve got money to spend, and boy do they use it. Image is important to American colleges - this does also make for a nicer experience.

Rice U's campus at sunset

Univ of Notre Dame

Middlebury College campus

Univ of Washington campus

Duke’s Chapel

Berry College

Columbia

An extra year.

Columbia in the summer term.

More time to experience things at the university & the location. 4 years in New York City for free is awesome. More time to take classes, meet people, go places, do things - experience. I changed my course twice, traveled to different cities, relaxed some semesters (terms), met people from all around the world and different Ivy League unis, got on my modeling and acting stuff.

International network

Your network is your net worth. The more people you have good connections with, the generally better your life will be. This extends to job opportunities and social events of any kind.