A TEENAGER is to embark on his own American dream after securing a paid-up place at a top US university for the next four years.

Owen Ogden, from Abbeytown, will fly across the Atlantic in August after receiving his A-level results to take up his place at Yale University.

The 17-year-old, a sixth former at Nelson Thomlinson School in Wigton, is one of 43 British state school students to win scholarships to study at 28 top American institutions through an early admissions process operated by the Sutton Trust US Programme.

As well as Yale, some have been successful in securing places at places like Princeton and Harvard.

Owen – who is one of two to win a place at Yale, in New Haven, Connecticut – is likely to graduate with little to no debt because he will not have to pay a penny towards his studies or living expenses.

Costs covered by his individual financial package include his accommodation, air fares, food and even money towards holidays.

Between them, Owen and his fellow 42 scholars have been offered $10m – almost £6.9m – of financial aid from the universities over the next four years.

More than half of them are from families that earn less than £25,000 a year, and for 86 per cent of them they are the first in their family to go to university.

Owen, who is in year 13, said: “I’ve moved about quite a bit already having lived on the Isle of Man and we’re from the east of England originally, so I’m quite excited about the move. It is going to feel like an adventure.”

The options that American college education can offer students compared to the UK higher education system attracted Owen to apply. “I love history but I was thinking about the job opportunities and I wasn’t too sure about what I would want to do when it comes to choosing a certain course or area of study now,” he said.

“The system over there is different where you all do an open course in the first year then you go on to major in an area you want to later. It really appealed to me.”

As part of the application process, Owen had to complete two admissions tests – the ACT and SAT. He got 33 out of 36 questions correct in a section of the ACT, putting him among the top one per cent who took the test.

Owen, who lives with his parents Barry and Jane, also applied to UK universities through the usual Ucas route, but will now be turning offers down.

Owen and his older sisters Sarah-Jayne and Alison are the first in their family to go to university.

“My father left school with no qualifications,” said Owen, “and his response when I found out I’d got in was typically British – ‘I thought you’d get in’. They were of the generation I suppose that weren’t inspired to go on in education. It is very different today.”

In 2015, Owen was one of 150 students selected from over 4,000 UK applications to go to an American summer school, spending a week living on campus and visiting US universities.

For over half of them, including Owen, it was their first trip to the US.

The Sutton Trust US Programme is run in conjunction with the US-UK Fulbright Commission and aims to encourage academic teenagers from low and middle income families to apply to study in America.

The trust already has 135 UK students on courses at US universities.

Sir Peter Lampl, chairman of the Sutton Trust, said: “Our US Programme is a life-changing experience so I’m delighted that so many young people from low and middle income backgrounds have benefited from it this year.

“The 43 talented students will enjoy a broad and varied curriculum and, with generous financial aid packages on offer, will graduate from some of the world’s best universities debt-free.”

Penny Egan, executive director of the US-UK Fulbright Commission, said: “To have 43 state school students admitted early to some of the best universities in the world is testament to the calibre and talent of our programme participants.

The US scheme is based on the Sutton Trust’s flagship programme in the UK which now runs at 10 leading British universities.

  • Yale is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut – 90 minutes from New York. It was founded in 1701 in Saybrook Colony as the Collegiate School. It is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the US. It has more than 5,400 undergraduates – 87 per cent of which live in university housing, 4,400-plus graduate students, and 4,410 international students and scholars.