A talented Kent student is off to Harvard - where she hopes to fulfil her dream of becoming a roller coaster designer.

Molly Bosworth, 18, scooped topped marks in her A-levels, despite it having been a rocky year for many due to a new grading system introduced in the wake of the pandemic.

The Simon Langton Girls' Grammar School pupil, from Tankerton near Whitstable, had initially set her sights on the University of Cambridge.

And on A-level results day on Thursday, she was delighted to discover she had achieved the marks required to get into the prestigious institution.

But for her, this was just the "icing on the cake".

Having aced a rigorous series of exams last summer, the 18-year-old has known for months she has an unconditional place at Harvard.

There, she will study to become a civil engineer so she can follow her true passion: roller coasters.

"My dream job would be designing roller coasters," she said. "Working for Disney as an imagineer, or designing roller coasters for Alton Towers or something - that would be the dream.

"I like going on them, but I also research and read about them a lot. It's definitely an academic interest too."

Molly says she chose Harvard over Cambridge, partly because of the American degree system, which sees students major and minor in different subjects.

"Over there it's completely different," she said. "Under the liberal arts programme, rather than applying for a course that you then study for three or four years, you take 32 different courses over four years."

This means that as well as doing subjects she requires to get into civil engineering, such as maths and physics, she can also "get back into loving history again".

She says the surprisingly low fees charged by Harvard were also a major factor in her decision.

"For Cambridge I would have had to take out a student loan," she said.

"But with Harvard, because of the position I'm in, I get education, accommodation, food, flights, everything, basically free on a scholarship.

"I think the total cost for four years goes roughly to about $200,000. And I think all I had to pay was about £150 as a token.

"They accept all the students they think deserve places, and only then do they look at your financial situation. So the idea is, anyone who they think is suitable for Harvard can afford Harvard."

Sadly for Molly, she will be studying the entire first year of her course remotely from the UK because of the coronavirus outbreak.

"It was really gutting," said Molly, who has visited America but has never been to Harvard, or the state of Massachusetts in which it lies.

"But they have promised that we will get our freshman experience, just a bit later, in our second year.

"It's certainly exciting. I feel mostly for my parents, because I'll be in a different country. But I'll still be a phone call away.

"I'm most looking forward to meeting people from all over the world."

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