<p>Does anyone know the requirements for a postgraduate course in English, History of Arts or IR for St Andrew’s? I will complete my BA Hons in English from an Indian institute this year.</p>
<p>Do you know about the FB page for American parents?-it has good info.</p>
<p>To jhowell, you’ll get it. </p>
<p>Its literally laughable how easy it is to get into St. Andrews from a school such as Andover or Exeter (I went to one of the two). Students with a GPA of a 4.0 out of 6 got into St. Andrews and (at best) schools such as Trinity College, Boston College, and Skidmore. And these were my friends whose grades and college applications I knew intimately. My girlfriend, in fact, dreamed of Georgetown but with a 4.1/6 and a 2030 SAT score, she got into Skidmore, Trinity, Tulane, and St. Andrews while being rejected by ‘top 15’ schools such as Northwestern, Carnegie Mellon, Notre Dame, Georgetown, Cornell, and even average schools like NYU and BC. They are all good schools, but Americans from Andover who can pay full tuition really piggyback off the Scottish and European elite who end up there. She’s at Trinity in Connecticut, loves it, and I’m going to yale so it works out in the end. I’ve heard of kids getting acceptance letters a few days after they applied! They’ve tried making it as easy as possible for Americans to get in without getting students who couldn’t graduate in time. </p>
<p>Having said all that, I have to be impartial. St. Andrews is a really good school and prep school students who have prepared well thanks to an Andover or Exeter tend to thrive at St. Andrews or Edinburgh, particularly because of how alcoholic some British youths are (this is not simply a generalization born out of isolated anecdotes and limited observations but a documented sociological trend). </p>
<p>So, if your son or daughter can get into St. Andrews, congrats. It is the equivalent of a top 15 school in America in terms of quality and it beats all of them (except in my biased opinion, Harvard/Yale/Princeton/Stanford) but it is not the equivalent in terms of selectivity. That’s not an issue you should be concerned with in one sense, but I do feel morally disgusted and sad that rich kids such as myself or my girlfriend have this opportunity and tremendous back-up that other American or international students don’t have. </p>
<p>Two more things. Firstly, some really rich Americans with connections to an Ivy will go to St. Andrews for a year if they weren’t qualified enough to get in regular. Then they will transfer after decent grades. This is all planned out and often given institutional support as Harvard does with its ‘Z-list’ or whatever that program is called. One of my Andover friends’ brother went through that process for Harvard. So this isn’t an argument for St. Andrews nor is it one against it. </p>
<p>Secondly, are there students who seriously love St. Andrews for its own sake? Of course and for a number of good reasons. But there are also a very very few number of students that would choose their state school or a BC (I know friends who chose BC over Harvard because BC is better at their respective sport) over Harvard or Yale. That doesn’t make BC - in my opinion - an equal school to Harvard. So I’m skeptical of students who say ‘Oh I never seriously considered the Ivies because I fell in love with St. Andrews’ if only because I’ve never seen that sentiment on campus or in person, but it could be plausibly true so who should doubt and argue about this over the Internet? </p>
<p>In the end, as long as you go to a school that exceeds a basic threshold of resources and reputation (and BC, Skidmore, St. Andrews and any other school I seemingly have dissed), your destiny is in exclusively in your hands. </p>
<p>Also students - from Yale and Harvard at least - came study abroad to St. Andrews just to have a great time and get good grades. You’re not there to learn a language, but network with cosmopolitan people and just revel in the British pub scene. The idea people are taking study abroad for serious scholarship from a school like Harvard or Yale is difficult to entertain unless there is a linguistic element to it or they may have a very closely related project (ie. a friend went to South Africa to study the legacy of apartheid).</p>
<p>Carbon:</p>
<p>Not sure why you are wringing your hands over the fact that St Andrews is easier to get into if you are an American.</p>
<p>It is little different than the situation where out of state students who can pay full tuition have a better chance of getting into an OOS state university.</p>
<p>That’s just the way it is. No different than the fact that your parents could afford to send you to a prep school (which is basically a college tuition every year). </p>
<p>As long as the Americans who got in to St Andrews are reasonably qualified, I see nothing that merits getting “morally disgusted” about. In fact, I am surprised more colleges don’t focus more on ability to pay. For example, if Duke has ten super qualified applicants for each spot, if I were the admissions director of Duke, I WOULD consider ability to pay. </p>
<p>It would no doubt have been much “fairer” if your parents’ money, which they used to send you to a private school, had been used to give assistance to underprivileged students, and you could have gone to a public high school, but fortunately, in America, we don’t do that. People are allowed to keep their wealth, and spend it the way they see fit. I don’t begrudge that. You shouldn’t feel guiilty or “disgusted” about it.</p>
<p>On another issue, I am not sure if I am perhaps picking up a little elitism on your part, with your stressing of prep schools like Andover or Exeter, but in the event I am, you might note that there are plenty of smart American kids out there that didn’t go to a prep school like Andover or Exeter, that are also going to St Andrews. And not all Americans going to St Andrews are from rich famiiles. Middle class families like mine sacrifice for our kids. We spend less money on ourselves, so our kids can go to the same school as rich kids.</p>
<p>I’m deeply considering applying early decision to St. Andrew’s and I was wondering if I had a shot. I have a 3.35 GPA weighted 3.8 and will be graduating with 7 AP classes taken and 5 Honors classes. I go to a very challenging Prep School, have taken Chorus and Spanish all four years, been admitted to an Honors Choir, am the Captain of the Spanish Team, took Debate for a year, won several writing competitions, have had 2 Art Works published in a Nationally Acclaimed Writing Magazine, and my article published in my local newspaper, and I attended a National Leadership Program over the summer.
Curious to see my chances despite my lacking GPA. Do you guys think I have a chance?</p>
<p>Mad:</p>
<p>I don’t think St Andrews looks that much at ECs. They go by standardized test scores. If you get “5” grades in some AP classes, that will be a big plus. And you will probably need about a 1950 on your SATs.</p>
<p>Will my ECs really make that little of an impact? Will they take into consideration my school rank and amount of APs?
Also, thank you for informing me about the importance of test scoring.</p>
<p>Mad:</p>
<p>My son is starting at St Andrews in September. I honesty don’t think ECs will do you that much good. But needless to say, I am not an admissions officer.</p>
<p>From what I can tell, they basically want to see some “5” grades in AP courses, and a high SAT score. And you have to write some sort of personal statement.</p>
<p>I would go on their websight and click on admissions and international students, and they tell you the minimum requirements.</p>
<p>But honestly, if you are hoping your ECs will help catapolt you into the highest ranking school possible, then I would say you would reach your highest potential, and get your biggest bang for the buck, if you apply to American schools, where such “soft” criteria have become widespread.</p>
<p>But in any case, having now gone through the process, my advice to you is to apply to a LOT of schools, because the acceptance rates at top schools, even for super qualified applicants, is very low. </p>
<p>I think it is also a good idea, from what I have seen, to apply to the tip top state universities, because they are looking for the out of state money. The same can be said of St Andrews, because I understand native Scots go for free, so Americans who pay full tuition are no doubt attractive to them. Even so, it is no cake walk for an American to get into St Andrews. It’s just somewhat easier. </p>
<p>As for as the UK, I wouldn’t limit myself to St Andrews. I think there is a common application you can use, to apply to 5 schools in the UK. Although St Andrews is certainly a good choice.</p>
<p>Perhaps your EC’s can be stressed in your personal statement. For example, I want to go to St Andrews because when I was President of the Debating Club, I realized that I had a strong interest in such and such.</p>
<p>If you research the 2013 “League” tables which recently came out, you can see how St Andrews ranks in the various subjects (for example, very high for politics)</p>
<p>It isn’t particularly selective for American students, especially in comparison to IVY league universities, because we have to pay full tuition. It is, however, one of the best universities in the world, as stated above. Other Scottish schools to look at are Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Aberdeen. Many of the English universities are good too-- Cambridge, Oxford (obviously), King’s College, Imperial College London, Exeter, etc, but those schools, particularly the high ones will be very selective, because of the differences in the American education system from the English system. If your test scores are good enough though, I would say take a shot. :). Trinity College Dublin is also fantastic (and has a nice campus, right in the middle of Dublin).</p>
<p>And about the UK common application, I think you can apply for more than 5 schools, though I have to check on that again. You can also apply to the same school for four different programs (though I don’t know why someone would do that). The application is through the UCAS, and I highly recommend checking out the website. It is sort of like the common application, and the process doesn’t seem too stressful. Most universities there have rolling admissions, except for Ox-bridge which have an application deadline of October 1st (and you can’t apply to both in the same year :P). Haha well if you want anymore advice just ask! My original dream was to go to the UK and study astrophysics. I sort of gave it up because of the distance, and because I can go for grad school I guess, and because my scores are horrible, but I love answering questions about it! :)</p>
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<p>Says who? It isn’t, it’s alright - and for a few subjects it’s very, very good (but unless you’re doing a PhD your department’s reputation won’t matter anyway).</p>
<p>St Andrews is certainly a good university but it is by no means one of the best in the world, or the UK for that matter. It has a massively inflated reputation; but in reality it is no better than Edinburgh, Durham or any other reasonably prestigious British university.</p>
<p>Regarding UCAS: basically you can apply to five different courses, these can all be at the same university or different ones. The exception to this is Oxbridge; you can only apply to one course at Oxford or Cambridge.</p>
<p>There was recently a ranking that came out that ranked St Andrews as one of the best universities in the world for “humanities”. So if I were going to study a liberal arts type subject, I may not care that St Andrews is not highly ranked in engineering, business, or chemistry.</p>
<p>University of Saint Andrews is one of the best Univeristies in the world. There are over 2500 colleges and universities worldwide… </p>
<p>Consider the US News placing it in the top 100 in the world. Also consider the schools clustered around it in the rankings. I am not saying its better, just look at its US company at this level.</p>
<h1>97 Saint Andrews</h1>
<h1>99 Dartmouth</h1>
<h1>126 UVA</h1>
<h1>166 Georgetown</h1>
<p>Consider the Guardian newspaper for the UK rating…</p>
<h1>1 Cambridge</h1>
<h1>2 Oxford</h1>
<h1>3 LSE</h1>
<h1>4 Saint Andrews</h1>
<p>St Andrews is definitely not within the top 4 in the UK in terms of academic rankings. It only became so because it scored well in the student satisfaction ratings. Without those criteria, St Andrews would hardly make it in the top 8 in the UK. The ff unis are, at least, superior to St Andrews academically: Cambridge, Oxford, LSE, Imperial, Warwick, UCL, Durham and Bristol.</p>
<p>you are talking rubbish. st andrews is better than all of those universities for Undergrad, but I accept that list is valid for Postgrad.</p>
<p>^ St Andrews is hardly even in the radar of most top employers in the UK, especially in the banking and finance world. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.highfliers.co.uk/download/GMReport12.pdf[/url]”>http://www.highfliers.co.uk/download/GMReport12.pdf</a></p>
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<p>I think you’re the one talking rubbish. St Andrews is nowhere near Oxford, Cambridge, LSE and Imperial. I would also place UCL and Warwick above it in regards to job prospects, fair to say that St Andrews is making a splash largely because of its rather famous alumni.</p>
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<p>USNEWS “World Rankings” is derived from QS, and is not meant to be a representation of undergraduate academic quality/recruiting/postgrad placement/prestige/reputation. I think that should’ve been evident when you see GWU and Penn St ranked above Georgetown.</p>
<p>In any case, St Andrews seems to be a well ranked university by UK metrics at least. Although its selectivity for US students is around that of GWU and BU at best.</p>
<p>My daughter has St. Andrews on the top of her list and would like to apply early, get accepted early, then not worry about where she is going for the rest of her senior year. Of course, that is assuming that she will get in, which is another topic. My question is when is the best time to apply? Because they have rolling application, will it hurt her to apply in September. Do they only take the very best early on, leaving spots open for later applicants? We live in the U.S., she got a 31 on her ACT, and her GPA is about 3.7.</p>
<p>My daughter applied in Oct. and was accepted in 2 weeks. Acceptance rates are different for different courses of study-you have to apply to a specific "major. She should be ok with her stats, even for IR, which is the most competitive.</p>