Would you turn down a place at Oxford or Cambridge? It’s not a choice that many of us will ever face. But it’s exactly what Anna Labno – and a small but growing number of our most brilliant school pupils – have done.

Five years ago Labno, then a gifted sixth-former at Cheltenham Ladies’ College, with six grade As at A-level, was offered a place both by Cambridge University and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on America’s East Coast. She plumped for the latter.

“I wanted to do research and you can do that from your very first year at MIT,” says Labno, who admits that money was also a factor. “The scholarships to go to MIT are much higher than the ones you get from Cambridge.”

Even after finishing the PhD in biophysics that she has now embarked on at another American university, Labno will graduate with only about $15,000 (£7,500) of debt. Her income was boosted by a job on campus – American students expect to work their way through college.

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The 22-year-old is riding the crest of a brain drain: some of our cleverest students are turning down offers from top British universities to study at Ivy League institutions.

At Sevenoaks in Kent, another well-known public school, one of its stars last year was offered a place by both Yale and Oxford. “She went to Yale,” Graham Lacey, the deputy head teacher, confirms. The year before, another high-flyer at the school chose Harvard over Cambridge. This year a sixth former is holding offers from Cambridge and a top American university.

“These pupils are so good they are spoilt for choice, but it’s only in recent years that they have chosen to go the American route,” explains Lacey. “It’s largely for financial reasons – they get a better deal there.”

“In such a competitive market Oxbridge could start to lose some of its top candidates,” agrees Vicky Tuck, head of Cheltenham ladies’ college, where the numbers applying for American universities have risen in recent years.

Figures obtained by The Sunday Times from the Ivy League of eight American universities show that there was a 38% increase in the number of British undergraduates starting courses last autumn compared with 2006. Harvard nearly doubled its numbers – from eight to 15 – and is keen to attract more with a recruitment drive in state schools.

Up to now the sums have put off most British students. It can cost up to £23,000 a year to attend an Ivy League university – a figure that dwarfs the £3,000 that British universities are able to charge. Moreover, the process is tortuous: candidates have to sit Scholastic Aptitude Tests and write separate essays for each university. The total number of British students at American universities is still less than 10,000.

American admissions officers are keen to emphasise that there are numerous grants on offer. Last week an Oxford spokeswoman, where 150 students turn down places each year, acknowledged that “there is no way we can compete with some of these financial packages”.

Paul Kelley, headmaster of Monkseaton language college on Tyneside is one of a handful of state school heads pointing some of his brightest pupils across the Atlantic. He thinks American universities are sometimes fairer when it come to selecting top students, too.

“They don’t ask what schools pupils went to,” he says. “English universities should adopt some of their admissions practices.”

Middle-class parents and teenagers should, says Kelley, look at “the global picture”. He reassures applicants who might be alarmed by last week’s news of campus shootings: “I wouldn’t worry at Harvard or Yale. They have rich, famous people there: security is rigorous.”

It was from Monkseaton that Laura Spence was accepted at Harvard eight years ago. Oxford had turned down her application to study medicine, despite predictions of five A grades at A-level. Spence’s rejection spawned headlines worldwide and prompted Gordon Brown to attack the university’s admissions procedures as “an old boy network”.

Harvard offered Spence a generous scholarship package to enrol on a “premed” liberal arts degree. She followed it with a Cambridge medical degree and is now poised to work as a qualified doctor. (Unlike in Britain, most American undergraduate degrees are “liberal arts”, studying a wide range of subjects initially and specialising only in the final years.)

Lara Dixon, also a pupil at Monkseaton and with five A grades at A-level, was another who was rejected by Oxford. She, too, set her sights on the best universities in the United States, winning a place at Harvard.

It’s not just for academic brilliance that full scholarships are awarded – American universities scout out sporting talent, too. Last year seven football-mad pupils from Monkseaton won “soccer scholarships” to American universities, each worth £15,000-£25,000 a year.

Speaking last week from Loyola College in Baltimore, Maryland, one of the seven, Phil Ban-nister, who is studying accountancy, said his package of $47,000 a year covered all his costs including tuition fees, accommodation and books. He simply pays for the cost of his seven-hour flights back to the UK. He has already won sporting acclaim in America and, while admitting that “my mum is missing me”, says: “I would like to stay here and get a good job.” Mark Mettrick, head football coach for men at Loyola, where five of the team are British, says that most stay in America to work as coaches or go professional after they finish their degrees. Other graduates have moved into business.

What about problems such as homesickness and whether employers in Britain understand the value of an American degree?

Hannah Metcalfe, a former pupil of City of London School for Girls who is now in her second year at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, says: “I did think about whether British employers would understand what my American degree is worth. But then I figured they would be impressed by someone who had something different on their CV – even if they don’t quite get what it means.”

Does she get homesick? “I’m pretty independent and I keep busy. Weekends are spent travelling or working. It’s only at Thanksgiving that everyone goes home.”

See university guide and www.fulbright.co.uk/eas/index.html for more information

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