This year’s busy H-1B cap season included many H-1B employee candidates who hold F-1 status and who are employed in the U.S. pursuant to F-1 optional practical training (OPT) status. Out of these F-1 visa holders, many [...]
With the approaching H-1B cap filing season, one of the most common concerns we are hearing from both prospective H-1B employers and candidates is about the H-1B cap lottery and the fact that the random lottery does not provide a great chance of an H-1B application being selected for review. Our office has handled thousands [...]
Many of our readers, and especially those foreign students on F-1 status who are in a technical field, are aware of the regulations which allow holders of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) degrees to obtain an additional 24-month OPT work permit extension, in addition to the 12-month post-completion OPT work permit. Understanding the eligibility [...]
Spring and early summer are generally busy period for recent foreign college graduates as far as employment immigration is concerned. On one hand, foreign college graduates are either applying for their initial term OPT, their 24-month STEM extensions (if they qualify) or their H-1B work visas under the H-1B cap. Our office fields many questions [...]
A district court judge for the Middle District of North Carolina has issued a nationwide preliminary injunction, effective immediately, enjoining USCIS's memo titled "Accrual of Unlawful Presence and F, J, and M Nonimmigrants," (see our article and analysis on the initial memorandum) originally issued on May 10, 2018, and updated on August 9, 2018, that [...]
Many of our readers are aware of the University of Farmington story from earlier this year when federal agents arrested and charged a number of individuals described as brokers, recruiters and students with a number of violations, [...]
USCIS has provided much needed clarification with respect to the ability of F-1 STEM OPT holders to be placed at and provide work at a location other than their employer’s office. Under the new guidance, USCIS is specifically [...]
Update (May 3, 2019): The Policy Memorandum has been blocked by a preliminary injunction. In a Policy Memorandum dated May 10, 2018 and effective as of August 9, 2018, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) is changing the way it treats non-immigrants who are in the U.S. on F, J and M status and, specifically, [...]
Our office has been seeing cases and reports that USCIS is changing their approach and starts to question the validity of F-1 CPT work authorization especially in cases where the F-1 foreign student has used more than 12 months of combined CPT and OPT at the same degree level. Most often this issue is [...]
The U.S. Embassy in Russia has announced that starting August 23, 2017, all nonimmigrant visa (NIV) operations across Russia will be suspended. Beginning September 1, 2017, nonimmigrant visa interviews will be conducted only at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow and interviews at the St. Petersburg, Yekaterininburg and Vladivostok will be cancelled. What is the Reason [...]
