The Sutton Trust in partnership with the US-UK Fulbright Commission is pleased to announce that 33 participants from the Trust’s US Programme have gained early acceptance to leading US institutions. Several others have been named as semi-finalists and finalists for prestigious merit scholarships.

The aim of the US programme is to encourage academically talented, low and middle income British students to consider studying at American universities. The 2013-14 programme cohort comes from across the UK, and 70% will be the first in their family to go to university.

Last year, 150 students were selected for a summer school in the US at either Yale University or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), spending a week living on campus and visiting a number of other US universities. They benefited from residential activities and received an intensive programme of support over a number of months before and after their US visit, which covered admission tests, college choices and applications.

The 33 students were selected under the early application deadline to US universities, and more students will be applying by the January deadline with results available later this spring. The biographies for all admitted students and scholarship finalists can be found online here.

Of the 33 accepted students, about half are from households that earn less than £25,000 a year, and over half will be the first in their family to go to university.

These students have already been offered a total of about $7.5 million (£4.5 million) of financial aid over the next four years.

They have been accepted to a range of leading institutions including: Barnard, Bowdoin, Brown, Bryn Mawr, Carleton, Claremont McKenna, Columbia, Dartmouth, Harvard, Lafayette College, Middlebury, New York University Abu Dhabi, Northwestern, Oberlin, Princeton, Skidmore, Smith, Soka University of America, Tufts, Trinity College, University of Pennsylvania, Williams and Yale.

Sir Peter Lampl, Chair of the Sutton Trust and of the Education Endowment Foundation, said: “I am delighted for the students and want to congratulate them on their tremendous achievements. I am sure they will have life-changing experiences from attending leading US universities. Aside from the educational benefits of four year study programmes, which combine breadth and depth, many American universities offer very attractive financial aid packages to enable those from low and middle income families to study there.

“Our US summer school programme is going from strength to strength. As well as offering a fantastic opportunity for some of our brightest young people to get a taste of life at leading American universities, it also lights a beacon for thousands of state school students who are genuine candidates for these universities.”

J Jeffry Louis, Chair of the US-UK Fulbright Commission, said: “We are delighted by these early university admissions results. To have 33 of our applicants admitted in the early admissions round and for them to receive such generous financial aid is a wonderful achievement and a testament to the high calibre of the programme participants. They will certainly inspire other British pupils to consider the States for their studies.”

In summer 2014, the programme will expand. There will be 175 places for British students, with 75 at Yale, 50 at the MIT, and 50 at Harvard, which most recently joined the programme having been a big supporter since it started in 2012. Applications for this year’s programme close 22 January 2014 and can be completed online via the Sutton Trust website. 

The US Programme is based on the Sutton Trust’s successful flagship programme in the UK which now runs at ten leading British universities and has benefitted over ten thousand state school students.

For further information please contact Sharmini Selvarajah or Conor Ryan at the Sutton Trust on 020 7802 1660 or Jamie Dunn or Lauren Welch at the US-UK Fulbright Commission on 0207 498 4020.

NOTES TO EDITORS

1. View the bios of all of the Sutton Trust US Programme 2013 participants who were admitted in the early round of US admissions and scholarship finalists. (http://bit.ly/EarlyAdmissionsBios) You can also find a chart of where the students were admitted below.

2. The Sutton Trust is a foundation set up in 1997, dedicated to improving social mobility through education. It has published over 140 research studies and funded and evaluated programmes that have helped hundreds of thousands of young people of all ages, from early years through to access to the professions. For more information visit www.suttontrust.com.

3. The US-UK Fulbright Commission is a not-for-profit organisation funded by both governments to promote educational exchange between the US and the UK. The Commission offers prestigious awards for postgraduate study and research in the US, as well as an Advisory Service and is the government recognised source of US study information in the UK. For more information visit www.fulbright.org.uk.

4. The Sutton Trust has run summer schools in the UK since 1997. Summer schools offer young people from low and middle income backgrounds in year 12 – mostly 17 year-olds – a chance to get a taste of student life at a research-led university. The programme balances busy academic days with social activities and has been successful in encouraging bright state school students from low and middle income families to study at the most selective universities in Britain.