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H1-B Annual Caps: Your Client’s Degree, Job, and Visa Status

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals

Talk of raising the H1-B annual cap from 65,000 visas to 110,000 will not come to fruition for the FY 2017 filing season. This means that the same number of annual H1-B visas will be available for a rapidly growing number of candidates. CIS is required to accept petitions for at least the first five days of the filing season. If the last two years are any indication of what is to come in April, those are the only five days you and your client will have to file. CIS is inundated with way more petitions than there are visas, and to make sure your client’s petition is one of them you need to be ready to file on April 1st.

However, your client may not be subject to the 65,000 annual visa cap. There are also an additional 20,000 H1-B visas available for candidates with Master’s Degrees. Some employers are not even subject to any annual cap at all. Some candidates aren’t either. So what category does your client fall into?

To start, let’s take a look at how many H1-B visas are available, and then let’s look at how candidates are selected for these limited number of visas. Finally, we will see which candidates and employers are cap-exempt.

There are 65,000 H1-B visas available annually for candidates with a US Bachelor’s degree or its equivalent, or higher levels of education. There are also an additional 20,000 H1-B visas available for candidates with US Master’s degrees or its equivalent or higher. After all of the petitions are in, CIS will hold a lottery to determine which candidates with Master’s degrees will get the additional 20,000 H1-B visas. This lottery is conducted via random computer selection. After these petitions have been selected, any candidates with Master’s degrees or higher who were not selected for these 20,000 will roll over into the regular lottery for the annual 65,000 visas for candidates with Bachelor’s degrees of higher. The same random computer selection process will determine who will be selected for these visa slots from the pool of petitions.

However, there are many circumstances in which your candidate may not be subject to the annual H1-B visa cap at all. This has to do with your client’s current visa status, and your client’s employer.

If your client is already working under H1-B visa status, he or she is probably cap exempt. Candidates filing for H1-B extensions and H1-B transfers are not subject to the annual cap. H1-B visa holders can also take on another concurrent H1-B job without being subject to the annual cap when they file for an H1-B visa to work this job as well. New jobs and concurrent jobs must also meet H1-B specialization requirements, and your client must also meet H1-B educational requirements, but their petition will not end up in a lottery. Candidates who must file a new petition because the terms of their H1-B job has changed are also cap-exempt. The new terms must still, however, meet H1-B requirements as must their education.

Some employers are cap-exempt, and if your client is employed by one of them, their petition will not be subject to the H1-B lottery. Non-profit organizations and non-profit research institutes are cap-exempt. Institutions of higher education and governmental research organizations are also cap-exempt, as are hospitals. Even if this is your client’s first time petitioning for an H1-B visa, if their job is for one of these kinds of employers, their petition will not be subject to the annual cap.

Before you and your client file their H1-B petition, here are three key elements you need to determine:

  1. What is your client’s degree?
  2. Is your client’s employer exempt from the annual H1-B cap?
  3. Is this your client’s first H1-B petition, or is it a transfer, extension, or additional H1-B job?

Answer these three questions, and you will find out what caps – if any – your client’s petition will be subject to.

If your client is cap exempt, this is NOT an excuse to file a shoddy petition. Just because a petition does not go through the lottery does not mean it can’t be rejected. RFE’s are on the rise for petitions subject to the annual cap AND cap-exempt petitions.

To qualify for an H1-B visa, your client must have a US Bachelor’s degree or higher, or its foreign equivalent. Whether or not your client’s job is cap exempt, RFE’s are on the rise. As you prepare to file, it’s important to keep in mind that your client’s foreign education will raise issues with CIS if it is submitted without a detailed credential evaluation in accordance with CIS education combination requirements and precedents. Talk to an evaluator with extensive experience in H1B cases, RFEs, and difficult cases. They know what works and what does not work to get your client’s visa approved.

About the Author

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of TheDegreePeople.com, a foreign credentials evaluation agency. For a no-charge analysis of any difficult case, RFE, Denial, or NOID, please go to http://www.ccifree.com or call 800.771.4723.

H1-B Annual Caps: Your Client’s Degree, Job, and Visa Status Read More »

H1B Educational Requirements Your Client Needs to Know About to Avoid an RFE

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals

Wrong.

And getting more and more wrong as CIS trends grow increasingly complex with regards to candidates’ education. As the IT industry grows, requiring more highly skilled workers to fill the increasing number of jobs that US citizens cannot fill, IT companies that can afford to hire H1B workers are doing so. While the number of H1B jobs in the United States has skyrocketed, the number of annual visas available has not. At the same time, tightened educational requirements are part of CIS’s attempt to mitigate visa fraud. CIS trends fluctuate from year to year, and even a perfectly filed petition for an over-qualified candidate can receive an RFE. Understanding these educational requirements and how to meet them – and sometimes how to meet them in creative ways – will help your client get their visa approved without CIS ever issuing an RFE.

Candidate’s Degree Must be a US Bachelor’s Degree or Its Equivalent

This requirement is not as straightforward as it sounds. If your client has a four-year Bachelor’s degree from a US college or university, go ahead and file. All other degrees need to be reviewed by a credential evaluator. Foreign degrees need a credential evaluation because educational systems vary from country to country, and the academic value of a bachelor’s degree from one place does not necessarily equate because it’s called a bachelor’s degree. In the same way, a foreign certification or licensure may actually be the equivalent of a US bachelor’s degree even though it doesn’t call itself a degree. For example, one situation that triggers a lot of RFE’s is when a candidate has an Indian Chartered Accountancy certification. This is actually the equivalent of a US Bachelor’s degree in accounting, but the same certification in Canada is not. The Canadian Chartered Accountancy certification is a professional license, but not post-secondary education. See how this gets confusing? A credential evaluator can make the necessary equivalency determinations about your client’s education, explain how the equivalency works, and back up with equivalency with evidence.

Four Years of Post-Secondary Education Matter

If your client has a three-year bachelor’s degree – ESPECIALLY if it’s an Indian three-year degree – their education is likely to trigger an RFE if it is not handled correctly. CIS trends require focus on longevity rather than academic content when it comes to years of college or university, so it is you and your client’s responsibility to show that academic content and progressive work experience comprise a fourth year of college credit. How can you do this? There are two options that we have seen work almost every time when it comes to the H1B visa. An evaluator can convert years of progressive work experience into college credit. Progressive experience means that your client’s job required them to expand their knowledgebase and skillset, and take on increasing amounts of work and responsibility. Three years of this nature of work can be converted into one year of college credit. Never submit an H1B petition without an evaluation that accounts for the missing fourth year.

Degree Must Be Specialized and Exactly Matching Candidate’s Job

This is a relatively new requirement that takes many H1B candidates, their employers, and their lawyers by surprise. While it’s common for an employer to hire a candidate with a degree in a field related to the job, CIS will not approve their visa. In the past six or seven years, CIS trends have changed regarding this requirement. In the past, a candidate with a degree in a related field would have the petition approved, now instead they receive an RFE. Your client’s degree major must be an exact match for their field of employ. At the same time, because H1B requirements indicate the job must require specialized knowledge and skills to carry out its duties, candidates with generalized degrees are also running into this problem. If your client is in a mismatched degree situation, your client needs to prove that she does possess the specialized skills and knowledge required to be successful at her job even if it is not directly reflected in her college major.

The way to do this is to prove equivalence to a US bachelor’s degree in her field of employ with a credential evaluation. The way this works is an evaluator can convert years of progressive work experience in her field of employ into college credit hours in that major track with the three years of work to one year of college credit conversion. The evaluation must show that your client has the equivalent of a US four-year bachelor’s degree with the bulk to the equated credit hours in their field. This requires a detailed evaluation with a credential evaluator familiar with CIS educational requirements, as well as precedents of what they will accept and what they will not accept.

If your client as anything but a straightforward US four-year bachelor’s degree, have their education reviewed by a credential evaluator to see what you need to do to avoid an RFE.

About the Author

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI TheDegreePeople.com a Foreign Credentials Evaluation Agency. For a no charge analysis of any difficult case, RFEs, Denials, or NOIDs, please go to http://www.ccifree.com/ or call 800.771.4723.

H1B Educational Requirements Your Client Needs to Know About to Avoid an RFE Read More »

H1-B Checklist to Avoid an RFE in 2016

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals

The date to file your client’s H1-B petition for the 2017 fiscal year is coming up fast. Last year’s trends and the trends of years previous are expected to continue, and that means even more petitions flooding in for the same number of annual visas. That also means more RFE’s that you might have to deal with. An RFE is not the end of the world, and can oftentimes be addressed with success, an RFE is a big red flag on your client’s petition waving to CIS to take a close, scrutinizing look. This can turn up minute details that would otherwise have been overlooked but now count against your client’s likelihood of approval.

CIS has a big job to do and red flags make their job of sorting through hundreds of thousands of petitions easier. Filing an impeccable petition also makes their job easier. While CIS is known to issue an RFE for no apparent reason, most RFE’s can be avoided. That means it’s time to break out your H1-B checklist.

  1. Is your client’s job a specialty occupation?

What does this mean? To CIS, a specialty occupation is a job that requires your client to hold a US bachelor’s degree in the field or higher, or its equivalent to carry out the duties of said job. Their job must require specialized skills and knowledge to perform. How can you prove this? A copy of the ad for your client’s job that includes minimum requirements can be used as evidence, as well as similar postings for similar jobs working for similar companies. If your client’s job requires a bachelor’s degree or higher but similar positions do not, you need to supply more evidence. This means expert opinion letters, which can be useful anyway, as well as evidence that shows the skills needed for this particular job are more advanced due to the unique nature of your client’s particular job.

  1. Does your client’s education meet the requirements for their job?

Once you’ve established that your client’s job is H1-B qualified, it’s time to make sure you’ve proven your client is qualified for his or her H1-B job. This means they have a bachelor’s degree or higher in the required field, as well as the necessary training and work experience the job requires.

  1. Is the value of your client’s education clear to CIS?

If your client’s degree is from a country outside of the United States, it will need to be evaluated for US equivalence. Anything besides a very straightforward US bachelor’s degree needs a credential evaluation. Never submit an H1-B petition with a foreign degree without a detailed credential evaluation. This is an increasingly common RFE trigger. The Indian and other three-year Bachelor’s degrees commonly trigger RFE’s because of the missing fourth year. A credential evaluator can convert years of progressive work experience in your client’s field of employ into college credit to account for the missing year. Progressive means that the candidate’s work required them to take on more responsibilities and develop their knowledge base and skill set to meet the increasing demands of the work. Three years of progressive experience in the field can be equated to one year of college credit. All that is needed is a well-documented evaluation to prove it.

Another common problem that trigger RFE’s for even the most qualified candidate’s petition is that they have a degree that doesn’t call itself a degree. Many countries have degrees that require postsecondary education and the necessary stages of education to meet Bachelor’s degree requirements, but don’t actually have the word “degree” in the title. These certifications also require a credential evaluation because while in some countries these are degree equivalencies, in other countries they are not. Because this is not clear and straightforward, without a credential evaluation CIS will not have enough evidence to approve your client’s petition.

  1. Do your client and his or her employee have an employer-employee relationship?

What is an employer-employee relationship? To establish that your client and his or her employer have this kind of relationship, the employer must be able to hire, fire, promote, pay, and otherwise control the work that the employee does. To prove that this is the case, submit a copy of the employment contract, and other documentation that clearly displays the nature of your client’s work.

  1. Does your client’s degree match his or her field of employ?

Just six or seven years ago, H1-B candidates were able to get their visas approved with a degree in a field related to their job. Now, CIS requires an exact match. Employers hire employees for specialized positions with bachelor’s degrees in related fields all the time. CIS, however, does not approve their visas. Instead, they get RFEs. If your client’s bachelor’s degree is generalized or in a field related to but not an exact match for his or her job, have a credential evaluator review their educational documents. Oftentimes, a detailed evaluation that takes work experience into account to draw an equivalency to a degree in the matching field.  Years of progressive work experience in the field can be counted towards this matching degree specialization with the three years of experience to one year of college credit conversion. This can both work to account for the missing fourth year in three-year Bachelor’s degrees, AND to write an equivalency for a specialized degree in your client’s exact field of employ.

Before you file, sit down with your client, your client’s employer, and your credential evaluator and go through these questions. Ask, is this true? Then ask, have we provided the evidence necessary to clearly prove to CIS that this is true? Don’t ever file without doing everything you can to make sure you and your client got the petition right the first time. There’s no need to wait for an RFE.

About the Author

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI TheDegreePeople.com a Foreign Credentials Evaluation Agency. For a no charge analysis of any difficult case, RFEs, Denials, or NOIDs, please go to http://www.ccifree.com/ or call 800.771.4723.

H1-B Checklist to Avoid an RFE in 2016 Read More »

Granting Citizenship and Expanding the H1B Program Can Improve the Economy

Immigration

Economists across the United States are almost entirely unified in agreement that granting citizenship to undocumented immigrants will significantly improve the US economy within five years.  However, the longer we wait, the smaller the positive impact this will have.  The sooner undocumented immigrants are granted citizenship, the more the benefits to the US economy are maximized.  This is because these undocumented immigrants will make higher wages, pay higher taxes, and use their higher earnings to stimulate the US economy, and the sooner this ball gets rolling the better.

It is estimated that granting citizenship to undocumented immigrants will generate 1.4 trillion dollars in economic growth and 184 billion dollars in tax revenue.  Within five years of being granted citizenship, undocumented immigrants are estimated to see a 25.1% rise in their annual incomes.  This extra money will ripple through the US economy.  This is because not only is more money going into the pockets of these workers, but also with citizenship they can spend this money freely without concern of it being traced back to its illegal origins.  They can purchase a wider variety of products in the United States, and with their higher incomes, they can purchase more of it.  Not to mention, their incomes could be taxed, and at higher rates than they would have been with 25.1% less annual income.

While granting citizenship to undocumented immigrants will absolutely benefit the US economy in a short amount of time, economists warn that this change ALONE is not enough to create a massive resurgence in the US economy.  However, immigration is the answer in the form of granting citizenship to undocumented immigrants as well as expanding programs that bring highly skilled workers to the United States to work under H1-B visa status for high salaries for the growing STEM industries.  STEM industries are expanding faster than the US workforce can fill the jobs that require highly adept math, science, and engineering skills.  These are the big money industries that the US needs to stay competitive in the international marketplace as well as stimulate economic growth in a struggling economy.

About the Author

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI, TheDegreePeople.com, a foreign credentials evaluation agency.  For a no-charge analysis of any difficult case, RFE, Denial, or NOID, please go to http://www.ccifree.com/?CodeBLG or call 800.771.4723.

Granting Citizenship and Expanding the H1B Program Can Improve the Economy Read More »

Job Description and the Degree Requirement: Is Your Candidate H-1B Qualified?

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals

Whether you’re looking into hiring on a new employee under H-1B status, or taking on a current L-1 or TN employee as an H-1B employee for this next fiscal year, it’s time to get going. USCIS begins accepting petitions for this much sought after visa on April 1st. If the past several years are any indication of what is to come, you will only have a five-day window to get your client or employee’s petition in the H-1B lottery.

Before you even get started, there are two very important questions about whether or not the job and the employee are H-1B qualified you and your client or employee should be asking:

  1. Is the job itself a specialty occupation?
  2. Is my employee or client educationally qualified for this specialty occupation?

To qualify for H-1B visa status, the job must require a US bachelor’s degree or its equivalent or higher to show that the position requires the employee to possess specialized skills and knowledge to carry out successfully. Mid-sized companies in particular are asked to justify why someone with a bachelor’s degree or higher is required for the job, and you need to show this through evidence and documentation. For example, the ad for the job can be used as proof if it indicates that as a minimum qualification the employee must have a bachelor’s degree or higher. You can also show that similar jobs for similar companies also have these specialized requirements. However, if the job requires a generalized degree – even if it is a bachelor’s degree – you may run into problems because a generalized degree does not indicate that specialized knowledge and skills are required. This is where alternative forms of evidence, like expert opinion letters and examples of similar jobs for similar companies come in particular handy. It is on you to prove that you require a highly skilled employee with a specialized knowledge base to successfully carry out the duties of an H-1B job.

Say you’ve established that your company absolutely needs an employee with a bachelor’s degree or higher and a specialized knowledge base and skill set to carry out the duties of this H-1B position. NOW you need to show that your H-1B candidate is that employee with the required education and specialized knowledge base and skill set. How do you do this? If your candidate has a bachelor’s degree or higher from a US college or university with a major that is an exact fit for their field of employ, it is straightforward. If your candidate has a degree from a different country or with a major in a different field – even if it’s in a related field – from their field of employ, you will need to take one more step to meet this H-1B requirement.

CIS does not accept a three-year degree as the equivalent of a US four-year degree at face value. However, when evaluated for academic course content, an evaluation agency with the authority to convert classroom contact hours into college credit can use this technique to take a close look at your client or employee’s degree and bridge the missing year. An evaluator with the authority to convert years of work experience into college credit can follow the 3-1 rule and convert three years of progressive work experience in the field into one year of college credit. Both of these careful evaluation methods can also be utilized to show specialization in the candidate’s field of employ if they have worked in the field or taken enough classes throughout their college career in that field.

Don’t wait until it’s too late to get started on your employee or client’s H-1B petition. This is US immigration, which means it’s a bundle of details and documentation that often takes time and energy to get in order. If your client or employee needs a credential evaluation to show that they meet CIS educational requirements, start looking for the right credential evaluation agency to meet your needs. The right agency should be able to right an evaluation as unique as your client’s education, and they should have a firm understanding of CIS trends and the different academic requirements for different visas.

About the Author

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI, TheDegreePeople.com, a foreign credentials evaluation agency. For a no charge analysis of any difficult case, RFE, Denial, or NOID, please go to http://www.ccifree.com or call 800.771.4723.

Job Description and the Degree Requirement: Is Your Candidate H-1B Qualified? Read More »

What’s Standing Between Your Genius Client or Employee and Their Visa?

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals

Hundreds of thousands of highly skilled workers in STEM industries are sought out every year to come work in the United States. The reason being these industries are expanding so quickly and the jobs are becoming more and more complex, requiring technical expertise the United States educational system is notoriously weak at preparing students for. More highly skilled engineers are needed every year than the US workforce alone can provide. For this reason, if companies can afford it, they opt to sponsor employee Visas.

While sponsoring an employee’s work Visa can cost a company anywhere from $2,500-10,000 in legal fees and USCIS fees, it’s not the money that gets in the way of your genius client or employee obtaining his or her Visa. The fact of the matter is, many of the most brilliant minds followed eclectic or non-traditional educational paths to get to where they are. Common Visas for highly skilled workers – the H-1B Visa and the EB2 Visa – requires a candidates’ degree specializations to be an exact match for their job offers. However, it is common for talented engineers to have earned their degrees in related fields or vastly different fields. Some are largely or completely self-taught and have all of the skills and know-how through solo learning, work experience, and other non-traditional training opportunities.

For these reasons, while companies may jump at the opportunity to take these brilliant minds on to become assets to their companies and to US STEM industries, CIS educational requirements for Visas stand in the way.

Does this mean your client or employee with the specialized skills and knowledge to excel at their job cannot get their Visa because their degree doesn’t match?

Of course not!

A credential evaluator with extensive knowledge and experience with international education complexities, as well as CIS trends and federal case law can take a close look at your client or employee’s educational content and work experience. This way, an equivalency can be written to show that your client or employee has the equivalent of the degree necessary in the specialization necessary to qualify for his or her specialty occupation.

However, different work Visas have different requirements for where these educational equivalencies must come from. For example, if your client or employee is petitioning for an H-1B Visa and has a bachelor’s degree that is not an exact match for their field of employ, but has three years of work experience in the field, their education can be combined with the years of progressive work experience to write an equivalency that their degree is in their field of employ. Work experience and education can be combined to bridge that gap. However, if your client or employee is petitioning for an EB2 Visa and runs into that same problem, the evaluator must handle this differently because the particular Visa requires a single source degree.

Not all evaluation agencies know how to write the evaluation your client or employee needs for his or her particular Visa. When you call in to see if you want to work with any given agency, make sure that they are aware of CIS trends as well as the different educational requirements for different Visas. For example, if you let an agency know that your employee needs an evaluation for an H-1B Visa, they should quickly ask what the job offer is. If they don’t, look elsewhere. You want an evaluation agency that will tailor the evaluation to fit the needs of your client or employee’s unique situation and Visa. In essence, the evaluation must be as complex and unique as the genius it’s written for.

About the Author 

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI TheDegreePeople.com, a Foreign Credentials Evaluation Agency. For a no charge analysis of any difficult case, RFE, Denial, or NOID, please go to http://www.ccifree.com or call 800.771.4723.

What’s Standing Between Your Genius Client or Employee and Their Visa? Read More »

How to Bridge the Fatal Gaps Between Your Degree and Your H1B Job

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals


If your job offer is for accountancy but your degree is in economics, CIS will raise a red flag. If you have a generalized degree and are hired for any job that meets the specialization standards of an H1B Visa job, CIS will raise a red flag.

CIS requirements clearly state, “USCIS precedent decisions have confirmed that a generalized degree in business administration, absent specialized experience, is insufficient to qualify an alien beneficiary in a specialty occupation […] a petitioner with a business administration degree must establish a particular area and occupation in the field of business administration in which he is engaged.”

CIS states, “A generalized degree, absent specialized experience, is insufficient.”

Does this mean H1B candidates with degrees in fields that don’t exactly match but are related to their field of employ are out of luck? Absolutely not.

Even though your education alone cannot prove that you have the specialized skills and knowledge necessary to qualify for your H1B job, your education combined with work experience can. Employers hire candidates with related degrees because they have gained the specialized skills and knowledge they need for the job by directly working in the field. To prove specialization with a related or generalized degree, you need an evaluation of your education and work experience from a professor authorized to grant college credit for your work experience. ONLY a professor authorized to do this can write the evaluation you need to get your H1B Visa approved.

Authorized professors can convert years of progressive work experience into college credit to bridge the gaps between your job and your degree. Your work experience must be in the exact field of you H1B job. To qualify as progressive work experience, the nature of the work must have required you to take on progressively more work and responsibilities representing your progressively growing specialized knowledge base and skill set.

Don’t wait for an RFE or Denial to get your degree and work experience evaluated. While an RFE or Denial is not the end of the world, it is a big red flag to CIS that will trigger a close scrutiny of your petition. Minor errors and glitches that would have otherwise gone unnoticed will be unearthed because attention has been drawn to your petition. With hundreds of thousands of H1B Visa petitions to mire through, CIS uses red flags to make the hard decision of who gets their Visa approved and who does not for the set amount of annual Visa slots. Make the decision to approve your Visa easy by making your specialized knowledge and skill set clear with a credential evaluation from a professor authorized to convert work experience into college credit.

About the Author

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI TheDegreePeople.com a Foreign Credentials Evaluation Agency. For a no charge analysis of any difficult case, RFEs, Denials, or NOIDs, please go to http://www.ccifree.com/ or call 800.771.4723. Mention that you saw this in the ILW article and get 72 hour rush service at no charge.

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How to Bridge the Fatal Gaps Between Your Degree and Your H1B Job Read More »

Employment and Wage Rates Increased Due to H1B Program

Immigration, News

There are many ways H1B employees create more jobs.  First and foremost, these are hundreds of thousands of people earning high salaries for highly skilled jobs who come to live in the United States with their families for three to six years and sometimes more.  These are hundreds of thousands of people spending money in the United States who otherwise wouldn’t be.  H1B families rent homes, buy everything from cars to clothing to groceries, go to movies, get haircuts and go on vacations.  This creates jobs in all industries.

In a more direct way, however, H1B workers are also creating jobs in their fields for US-born workers both with and without degrees.  Highly skilled occupations – particularly in STEM occupations – require assistants and support staff.  These are positions that would otherwise not exist and are filled by US-born citizens.

At the same time as H1B workers create new jobs, the program has also lead to significant wage increases for existing jobs.  In fact, in May of 2014 the Bureau published a paper showing that the H1B program helped cause wages to rise significantly in STEM fields in 219 US cities.  This may be because labor conditions for H1B workers are very tightly regulated by the Department of Labor, which puts pressure on companies to have favorable labor conditions for all of their employees.  Prevailing wages and benefits are enforced for H1B workers.  Alongside that, employers are required to show that paying H1B workers prevailing wages and benefits won’t cut into the salaries and working conditions of their non-H1B workers.  This causes labor conditions to improve and wages to rise.

In the years to come, the US is looking at significant immigration reform including the expansion of the H1B visa program as well as allowing some H4 spouses – who come to the US with their H1B visa-holding spouses – to work.  Immigration reform means economic growth.  This is a good thing, and it’s about time.

Sheila Danzig, EdD

Executive Director CCI

1.800.771.4723

www.TheDegreePeople.com

Employment and Wage Rates Increased Due to H1B Program Read More »

The H1B Nicknamed the Genius Visa H1B Visa Program Keeps US STEM Industries from Collapse

Credential Evaluation, Immigration, Visa Approvals

Nicknamed the “Genius Visa,” holding an H1B visa enables foreign nationals with advanced degrees to live and work in the United States for up to six years. This Visa ensures that they get prevailing industry wages and benefits, and that the companies that hire H1B visa holders can take on these new hires without cutting into the wages and benefits of other employees. This Visa offers a unique opportunity for highly skilled workers to live and work in the United States long-term, with their families. It is a Visa of dual-intent, so while it is a non-immigrant Visa, H1B Visa holders can choose to pursue pathways to citizenship.

About 70% of all H1B Visas go to workers in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) industries. Why is this?

“Science is the engine of prosperity,” Dr. Kaku explains. “The United States has the worst educational system known to science.”

Students in the United States are not graduating high school or even college with the math and science skills necessary to fill the growing number of high tech jobs in places like Silicon Valley. According to Dr. Kaku, Silicon Valley would not even exist without the H1B Visa program because people coming to the United States to work on these Visas fill the positions that create entire STEM industries. Wall Street Journal agrees that when it comes to the highest level jobs at the highest level technology companies, Americans simply are not qualified. H1B workers are needed to create jobs for US citizens in these same industries because high-level jobs are necessary to create lower-tiered jobs in the industry through which US citizens can develop expertise through industry experience. Without a doubt, the “genius visa” is the secret ingredient that keeps STEM industries in the United States from collapsing.

While it may come as a surprise to some that Silicon Valleys are popping up in countries like China and India, it actually makes all the sense in the world because these are the countries that the top-level Silicon Valley engineers and developers are coming from. School systems in these countries cultivate strong scientific minds, and the United States attracts them with the H1B Visa program.

STEM industries aren’t the only fields attracting foreign geniuses. Dr. Kaku reports that 50% of all PhD candidates in the United States are foreign born, building the backbone of graduate programs in the country. Without the H1B visa program, 50% of all PhD candidates in the United States simply would not exist.

To qualify for H1B Visa status, a candidate must hold an advanced degree in a specialized field. That means having earned a bachelor’s degree or higher in a specialized field that matches their field of employ. While this sounds straightforward, variance of academic structures across borders muddles the value of any given degree. H1B Visa candidates are running into trouble getting their Visas approved because employers understand the value of their foreign education, but the USICS needs the value clearly articulated in terms of US educational standards. Candidates with three-year bachelor’s degrees in particular are running into trouble. When a candidate files his or her H1B Visa petition, an evaluation of their foreign degree must be included.

“Credential evaluation is a highly specialized process,” explains International Education expert and credential evaluator Sheila Danzig. “When we evaluate foreign credentials for US equivalence, we have to take classroom contact hours, USCIS and other legal precedents, university admissions decisions, and documented investigations into foreign education equivalencies into account to clearly spell out the value of your education.”

Dr. Kaku’s and the Wall Street Journal’s observations about the state of the US educational system are clearly reflected in the demographics of high-level tech jobs. All the same, the H1B Visa program requires candidates to prove their genius to their employers and graduate programs, as well as the bureaucracies that approve their visas.

About the Author  

Sheila Danzig

Sheila Danzig is the Executive Director of CCI TheDegreePeople.com a Foreign Credentials Evaluation Agency. For a no charge analysis of any difficult case, RFEs, Denials, or NOIDs, please go to http://www.ccifree.com or call 800.771.4723.]]>

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