Sutton Trust US Programme 2026 officially open!

Applications for the Sutton Trust US Programme are now officially open!
If you are a year 12 student who is even remotely interested in studying as an international student in the US, I would highly recommend applying here: https://us.suttontrust.com/
I am currently on part 2 of this programme and can say it has been absolutely life-changing. If you have any questions feel free to ask!

you quick w it lukie

Hiya I just wanted to ask if for the programme in part1 do they call your teachers for ur gcse results, because my results got remarked and it’s not on my new schools system yet and I don’t want them to think I’m lying

- Focus on impact. In the Extra-Curricular section, go in depth with how your activity has made an impact on yourself or your community. From what the staff have told me, they place a lot of value on community-impact, so if possible try to tailor at least one extra-curricular around this (eg you mentoring people, joining community clean-ups, campaigning, employment, etc)
- Complete everything you can on the application. I remember one part of it is an optional video response. You should absolutely do it. It WILL be cringe and you WILL feel weird talking to a camera, but it creates a much stronger application as they can match a face, personality, voice etc to your application. Also, I have not met a single member of the current cohort that has not done the video, so...
- The staff told me that the admissions process tries to mock the actual admissions process of US colleges. This means they do not just care about your grades, but also your extra-curriculars. There are some people on this year's cohort who did not get a single 9, but still got in because of their activities. Equally, a friend of mine got 5 9's and was still rejected. So make sure to put a lot of effort into your extra-curricular section. Add even the smallest stuff, like helping any siblings or cooking or learning an instrument or learning a language etc etc.
- Don't be robotic. Unlike usual oxbridge style applications, the US ones are a lot more personal/emotional (a bit corny) type. This is reflected in the admissions for the programme. They want to see you as a person, not just an academic, so try show that through the video response and the writing prompts they give.
- Remember their goal is to recruit students who they think would be accepted into a US college. Have a think about why you want to go to the US, why a US college would want you, these types of questions. You need a good understanding of this to be seen as an attractive applicant.
- Submit a day before the deadline. Since you are just starting year 12, you will soon find a lot of opportunities to get involved with. You want to leave as much time as possible to delve into those opportunities, so then you can talk about it in the application. You don't want to submit it, then do some amazing thing like win a competition, and then not be able to talk about it because the application is already submitted.
Best of luck, you've got this.

Hi! Im applying and im just really stressed about the extracurriculars, will it look bad if some of my extracurriculars i only started this month?

thank you and do you have any tips on sounding less robotic 🙏

Do not worry about this at all. Year 12 is the year all your opportunities typically form. Almost all of my ECs were things I had started only recently and it worked out for me. The staff understand year 12 is when you start a lot of your things and so its not a problem. This is why it is so important to submit a day before the deadline, to ensure you have taken all the opportunities you can during the start of year 12 and put it onto your application. Good luck!

Applications for the Sutton Trust US Programme are now officially open!
If you are a year 12 student who is even remotely interested in studying as an international student in the US, I would highly recommend applying here: https://us.suttontrust.com/
I am currently on part 2 of this programme and can say it has been absolutely life-changing. If you have any questions feel free to ask!

hii! could you detail what extracurriculars you did i think it would be cool to see what kind of stuff they really want from a participant in the program ))

Hi i need help on my application but i cant pm you is there anywhere else i can?