Jeez I don't know, the thing is that was my first idea was to go on a student visa, and even though I could get together that kind of money, its still a lot of money since I'm not convinced about getting a degree, but looking at the other options I'm not sure I have a choice.
Bear in mind that for the visa, you would need to show you have access to all 4 years of funding... so that means you would have to budget for about $200,000 to cover the entire course - and you'd need to show US immigration that you will have access to all of that money before you can even get the visa and enter the US (it kind of puts the UK fee increases into perspective, doesn't it?). Some universities have higher fees than others (often there are cheaper fees for those who already live in the state), but as an international student you would be charged the full amount (out-of-state fees).
Also, just as an FYI, the education system in the US is very different from the UK - essentially a US high school diploma is considered approximately equivalent to 5 GCSEs, so many US university students will spend the first year or two of their degree studying A level material, and then the last 2-3 years studying degree-level material - and a fair number of students don't decide their major (what subject their degree will be in) until their 2nd or 3rd year. US students also have to fulfill general education requirements at first, so you would be required to take classes in Natural Sciences, Arts and Humanities, and Social Sciences in your first year or two before you specialised in just one subject.
When I spent my third year of uni in the US, I went straight from second-year courses in the UK to 4th and 5th year courses in the US (I was in classes with people studying for US masters degrees and PhDs). I did take a first-year course in Astronomy, but it was so easy I got an A+ without even really studying (the course material included things that I'd helped my little brother learn for his Year 9 SATs and the final exam was a 15-minute multiple choice paper!).
In terms of costs and logistics, if you did decide to study for a degree, another option would be to do a UK degree, but one with a study abroad year in the US... that way you could live in the US for a year, but it wouldn't cost you nearly as much as actually studying for a whole degree there (the tuition for my exchange year abroad was just £500 (half UK fees), but had I been a regular student in the US, it would have cost me $20,000 instead).
But its only a city of 390,000 and even thougn I'm not a fan of big cities its only a slight step up from where I live now in terms of population
390,000 is actually a pretty decent size for a regular US city (i.e. not LA, NYC, Chicago etc.). I have relatives in Little Rock, Arkansas - it's the capital city of the state, yet in terms of population it's smaller than Plymouth and less than half the size of Bristol. The whole state is the size of England but only has a population of 3 million.... having said that though, Montana is 3 times the size of England and has less than 1 million people!
