How to make use of a grant in EB1-A application?

fandy

Registered Users (C)
A grant from NSF, or NIH is pretty tough to get. If someone has one (as a PI), how to include that in the petition? I searched a bit, it seems that USCIS doesn't think it is a national award. Can this one be considered as critical role or major contribution? What is the best way to argue? Can experienced people discuss that a little? Or I can find something on that somewhere? Thanks.
 
I used my PI/Co-PI role in grants (definitely not of NIH type) in my "orginal contributions of major significance" and also in "judge of the work of others". However, some friends in this forum felt that if you include your grant work as "judging others work" it would not be appropriate.

http://www.immigrationportal.com/showthread.php?t=244024&page=2&highlight=dgrajan

I.
"Participation on a panel or individually as a judge of the work of others in the field or an allied field"

"work of others" is the key. The work that is performed by your research grant is, in my opinion, yours; i.e. it will carry your name too when published .. would it not?

I may be wrong on this one; but it appears to me that the claim, at its best, is murky.

Potential source of a RFE? What do others feel?

II. I agree .. Research grant can satisfy "leadership/key role in a project" not "a judge of the work of others" ... good point

So, you can decide from these. Hope these help.

Good luck.
 
Thank you, djrajan. Congratulaions on your successful petition!

Here I would like to quote a paragraph from AAO regarding grant, just for information of interested people.

"In regard to the research grants for which the
petititioner or his emplyer applied and received funding, it is
noted that research grants simply fund a scientist's work. the past
achievements of the principal investigator are a factor in grant
proposals. The funding institution has to be assured that the
investigator is capable of performing the proposed research.
Nevertheless, a research grant is principally designed to fund
future scientific research, and is not a national or international
award to honor or recognize past achievement. Furthermore, we note
that a substantial amount of scientific research is funded by
research grants from a variety of public and private sources.
Therefore, we do not accept the assertion that the receipt of a
research grant places a scientist at the very top of his field."
 
You can use your grant as a separate category.(it worked for me, PI on an NSF grant). everything doesnt have to fit in one of the 10 categories. All the evidences together should present a picture that you have achieved eminence.
 
You can use your grant as a separate category.(it worked for me, PI on an NSF grant). everything doesnt have to fit in one of the 10 categories. All the evidences together should present a picture that you have achieved eminence.
Raj97, that is very interesting point. Could you give me some detail how you wrote the statement. Without loss of your privacy, could you please send me the paragraphs to me at fandory@gmail.com? Thanks a lot?
 
If you have the review statements from your grant, and the "investigators" section says something along the lines of "The applicant is clearly a leader in the field and is ideally suited to carry out this reasearch", I would think that would provide very strong evidence rather than recieving the grant itself-- as pointed out by fandy, there is precedence to not count grants as anything extraordinary since we all need them as part of our job.

Of course if you have a K award or other "training" grant, that could hurt you more than help you-- it implies that you need additional training.

While Raj97 used a grant as a separate category, we have no way of knowing whether it mattered or not... he may have had approval based on meeting the minimum criteria, so all the "extra" stuff just didn't play into the equation-- I think I have seen examples of this in the AAO decisions as well.

Just my thoughts-- the most important thing I've learned from this process is that the things that we consider important from an academic point of view (e.g. getting grants!) don't necessarily equate to the USCIS point of view-- it is all about objectively meeting the criteria-- at the end of the day, the adjudicators are very aware of what things are "routine" in academia... publishing, getting grants, reviewing for journals occasionally, etc. You need to find ways to craft your "routine" achievements to meet the wording of the criteria.

Just my thoughts... best of luck to you!
 
I agree that lot of things which are very important academically may not mean much from USCIS point of view. At the same time its difficult to say what exactly contributes and what does not while your application is being adjudicated.
In my case i dont know what clicked, but i fulfilled six out of 10 categories and added two more, which i could. Of course, each case is different, and how you present matters a lot. I claimed that the grant was awarded to me because i was considered an acclaimed researched and gave statistics about the success rate.
 
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