My rough sketch of an immigration plan needs improvement

[jackuk778]

Hello. I'm a U.S. citizen. I've been to the UK and mainland Europe several times. I love many things about Europe and my lifelong dream is to move to the UK or another EU country as a backup.

I'm currently saving up money to go back to school and get a degree.

Plan A
-------
Get college degree, look for a job in the UK or another European country and apply for citizenship or a visa or whatever it is I'll need (which I'm not too clear about!)


Plan B
-------
Try to go to school in the UK or mainland Europe

Plan C
-------
Claim citizenship through Ancestry. I'm hoping that after investigating my family history a bit more I might discover that I have a grandparent or great grandparent from somewhere in Europe and perhaps while getting my degree I could work on claiming ancestry.

The Problem
--------------
All of these plans are vague, I'm not sure where to start and I'm not sure if my plans are realistic. The only thing I'm absolutely sure about is that I want to spend my life living in Europe as a citizen.

Can you guys give me advice on how to realistically accomplish my goal or how to make a better plan?

Is age a barrier when it comes to acquiring citizenship in Europe? I'm not sure how long it will take to get my college degree and I don't know what age I'll be when I start going through the bureaucratic process involved in gaining citizenship and this makes me worry. I might be in my thirties.

[Directive/2004/38/EC]

Have you visited Europe? Why such a singular focus on moving there? How old are you and are you a US citizen? What are you doing now?

[jackuk778]

I edited my opening post to make things a bit more clear.

[Directive/2004/38/EC]

Hello. I'm a U.S. citizen. I've been to the UK and mainland Europe several times. I love many things about Europe and my lifelong dream is to move to the UK or another EU country as a backup.

I'm currently saving up money to go back to school and get a degree.

Plan A
-------
Get college degree, look for a job in the UK or another European country and apply for citizenship or a visa or whatever it is I'll need (which I'm not too clear about!)


Plan B
-------
Try to go to school in the UK or mainland Europe

Plan C
-------
Claim citizenship through Ancestry. I'm hoping that after investigating my family history a bit more I might discover that I have a grandparent or great grandparent from somewhere in Europe and perhaps while getting my degree I could work on claiming ancestry.

The Problem
--------------
All of these plans are vague, I'm not sure where to start and I'm not sure if my plans are realistic. The only thing I'm absolutely sure about is that I want to spend my life living in Europe as a citizen.

Can you guys give me advice on how to realistically accomplish my goal or how to make a better plan?

Is age a barrier when it comes to acquiring citizenship in Europe? I'm not sure how long it will take to get my college degree and I don't know what age I'll be when I start going through the bureaucratic process involved in gaining citizenship and this makes me worry. I might be in my thirties.

Plan B might be a good way of doing more in Europe. Some Eu countries still have (some schools?) free tuition. Finland is one which comes to mind. It is a great way to live for longer, and while you are doing that explore and find the options which will realistically work long term.

Plan C is fine if you have a particular relative, typically a parent or grandparent, who was born in Europe. But your knowledge of your family does not bode well for this.

You will otherwise have to find a job and a visa in Europe. That may work if you have a lot of talent in a particular needed area. Germany seems to be particularly positive to Americans/Canadians being there and then finding a job, though the details of the arrangements are not clear to me.

[jackuk778]

Thank you!

I have two questions for you about your response if you don't mind.

1: In order to find a job and a visa in Europe do I absolutely have to have a college degree to accomplish this? I understand that the UK's Tier 3 immigration route for low-skilled workers is currently suspended. Is this the case for the the rest of the EU or are low-skilled American workers allowed to immigrate to some EU countries?

2: Can an American actually apply for free tuition in Finland or another EU country and go to school there after obtaining a student visa or something similar?? That would be an amazing dream come true, which leads me to suspect I may be misunderstanding you. My grades were not great during highschool due to medical problems and lack of attendance and I can't imagine any college in America, yet alone Europe, letting me in for free.

[Directive/2004/38/EC]

1) Don't know, but probably not. But the more education you have, typically the more options you have in terms of visas.

2) Look at the web sites and call them and ask. You have to do all the leg work!

[jackuk778]

1) Don't know, but probably not. But the more education you have, typically the more options you have in terms of visas.

2) Look at the web sites and call them and ask. You have to do all the leg work!

Thank you, you've been very helpful. I'm just learning the basics about the immigration process so I'm probably asking a lot of stupid sounding questions. It seems there's many ways to go about living in another country and there's no one magic solution for 'How To Move To Europe' so thus far it's been very perplexing but I'm starting to get the idea here.