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Here's my problem. I'm a high-school student, from Africa, I will now have completed my last year there; However, the only choice available to me, in my country, are either engineering schools or medical schools. But my interests lie elsewhere, since I want to become a theoretical physicist, and that's obviously not possible with these two options. I've looked at foreign programs, in particular, undergraduate programs. I know beforehand that getting full scholarships is extremely difficult, but I thought that it would be a good idea to at least try. According to my limited knowledge on the exact procedures that are a necessity to get into a foreign university (either the US, or the UK, I didn't look yet at other possibilities), but one should make an application before applying for a scholarship. And to do so, one has to fit certain requirements, amongst whom are a set of standarized tests, the SAT/A Levels. I've spent nearly 5 months, going to the British and US councils, asking many institutions, but none offered the possibility to take either of these tests.

I now have exactly zero idea on how to proceed, which kind of gets depressing, and I'm worried that with the advance of my age, I may not reach my goal.

(Sorry in advance if this question possibly violates Academia.SE policies, but in case it gets closed, I ask the interested persons who want to provide some help [even an infenitesimal one] to send me an email which you can find in my profile)

Penguin_Knight
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mod33
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    Hopefully you've looked at a site like this -- http://www.internationalstudent.com/study_usa/application-process/ Is going to the local engineering school and then a foreign school for graduate work in physics a possibility? – Daniel R. Collins Feb 28 '16 at 21:04
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    I have closed this question because undergraduate admissions is, unfortunately, out of the scope of this site. Having said that: if SAT exams are the main barrier to entry for you for admission to US universities, try looking for some reputable colleges with test-optional admissions. (You should of course explain in your application that it wasn't possible for you to take the SAT or ACT in your current location.) – ff524 Feb 28 '16 at 21:53
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    Theoretical physics is quite heavy on the mathematics. You may get on the right track by studying mathematics first, and then moving into physics at a later point. In this regard, you may be interested in the African Institute of Mathematical Sciences that may have something for you: https://www.aims.edu.gh/aims-network/ – Wolfgang Bangerth Feb 28 '16 at 22:16
  • SAT testing now appears to be available internationally: https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/sat/register/international – jakebeal Feb 29 '16 at 03:28
  • @WolfgangBangerth I was thinking about that, my initial plan was to make a major in Mathematics and a minor in Physics, then to do physics at the graduate level. I already contacted the AIMS but I didn't have any response. – mod33 Feb 29 '16 at 12:36
  • @ff524 Thank you so much! I never thought that it was possible to make an application without these tests, and when I contacted some universities they were very strict about that and didn't mention any other possibilit. So I will definitely take a deeper look at that! – mod33 Feb 29 '16 at 12:40
  • @jakebeal In theory, yes. However in practice that's not quiet correct. After contacting the council, I was redirected to another institute, who also redirected me to another one, then I was asked to write my informations to an e-mail to register. To this day, I didn't receive any response. – mod33 Mar 02 '16 at 13:34

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