Successful J1 waiver (NOS, Philippines)

jcupertino said:
Was your program included in the skills set requirement?
Click to expand...

you can still apply for NOS. it is a case to case basis. because filing an Exceptional hardship is complicated than NOS. and besides, it's like your insurance. if you get denied (God forbid) for NOS. you can apply a waiver with Exceptional Hardship as your grounds. =)
 
Is there anyone able to obtain the NOS with their program within the skills list? How are you able to convince the committee for an automatic NOS?

Did anyone have to deal with the Alternative Arrangement option?
 
rmt511 said:
I came across your advise to missmykids and you mentioned about "O". My J1 visa is supposed to expire August 2009 but Amity cut it off to May 29, 2009, so I have a very limited time to complete my waiver and my bad I have not even started the process because of confusion. I emailed CFO several times but they are not responding. I might try the "O" you are trying to advise to missmykids. may you please give some info about this route. Thanks. I appreciate.
Click to expand...

HI guys,

I had my favorable recommendation from the Department of State last March 11. Now, I am waiting for the hard copy and the final waiver from USCIS. Hopefully I would be recieving it soon.
Thanks galantry.
 
Congratulations, Galantry!

galantry said:
Hi guys,

After getting a waiver of the J1 2-yr HRR, I moved to H1. Then, after a little less than one year on H-1, I applied for a green card under the EB2-NIW category. It was a self-petition and a self-representation which means I did it all by myself without a lawyer. I thought that the lawyers I had talked to did not have a solid understanding of my work so I was not sure if they could really write a strong and convincing cover letter for my petition. And besides, I wanted to put my good command of the English language to use.

After just seven weeks, I got approved and 2 weeks after that, I got my green card in the mail. I was really happy how things sailed through without hitting a big wave.

My advice to you guys is to first trust your capabilities. Only you can truly determine and sell your strengths in the cover letter. When in doubt or if you're not convinced that your case is strong enough, probably it is not and it would be best to wait a year or two to build a more attractive resume.

You can also seek the help of an attorney but remember, the lawyers can only do as much and in the end, it is your qualifications and your background that will eventually land you a green card.

Meet people in conferences. Attend the lectures of prominent people and if you get a chance to ask them a simple question after the end of their talk, do it and hand them a business card. I got five letters from well-respected and top scientists in my field by politely reminding them of our brief meeting (with my attached CV) and asking them if they could provide me a letter of support for my green card. All of them gladly wrote strong recommendations for me.

Scientific papers, even the simple ones with you as the second to the last author, count. So collaborate, collaborate and collaborate. And be nice too.

Lastly, super organize your application packet like your sanity depends on it or like how you wanted it to be presented to you. Immigration officers are just humans who could get exasperated and tired just from looking at disorganized and dirty application packets, especially that they read tons of documents at a time. An angry officer has clouded thoughts and partial judgment. Do not be a victim of it.

Thanks immigration portal folks for being a guide and a ready reference for my immigration journey in the United States. God bless America. It is now my permanent home too.

Galantry
Click to expand...



Hi Galantry,

Impressive work on both NOS waiver and EB2-NIW. (Hurray for Filipino talent!) I am in the same boat. I will be applying for NOS and do the EB2-NIW. Could you please give me some tips on how to make a successful NIW petition and a sample of your cover letter/recommendation letter? I have 5 first-author publications, more than 10 conference abstracts, and 20 total citations. Do you think this is good enough? They say that proving the third requirement for NIW (i.e., not to do a labor certification) is the hardest. How did you go about this?

Thanks for your help!
 
jcupertino said:
Is there anyone able to obtain the NOS with their program within the skills list? How are you able to convince the committee for an automatic NOS?

Did anyone have to deal with the Alternative Arrangement option?
Click to expand...


Hi jcupertino,

Did you get any more info about your questions? Mine is also in the Skills lists but no government funding. Did you receive NOS approval already?
 
Thanks!

chigirl said:
Hi Galantry,

Impressive work on both NOS waiver and EB2-NIW. (Hurray for Filipino talent!) I am in the same boat. I will be applying for NOS and do the EB2-NIW. Could you please give me some tips on how to make a successful NIW petition and a sample of your cover letter/recommendation letter? I have 5 first-author publications, more than 10 conference abstracts, and 20 total citations. Do you think this is good enough? They say that proving the third requirement for NIW (i.e., not to do a labor certification) is the hardest. How did you go about this?

Thanks for your help!
Click to expand...

Hi Chigirl,

Let me be honest with you as I want you to succeed.

I think that generally, your case has a chance to be approved for EB2-NIW but you have to build a very strong argument to convince the immigration officer that you are well above and beyond most people in your field to be considered exceptional. In other words, among thousands of people in your field, what makes you different, unique and indispensable to America so that you rise above the others?

Five first author publications are not bad. However, you have to show that your publications have impacted your field, especially if you want your NIW to be approved. The best evidence for this would be: 1) number of citations. 20 citations for your five papers is a little low in my book, only 4 per paper. You can wait another year or two to accumulate more citations. Being cited by articles in high impact papers like Science, etc or by the higher ranked journals in your field would probably make a difference even if your citations are only 20. However, some immigration officers may not know the difference so there's safety in higher numbers. 2) your work not only being cited but also discussed by authors in your field and/or by authors in high-impact journals. 3) your work cited/discussed permanently in important public, national, scientific databases like OMIM. 4) you received an award of national or international scope for your paper/work (e.g. American Heart Association, etc). 5) you're one of the few or better yet, the ONLY ONE in your field in the entire USA to be able to perform your work so that if you're allowed to leave the USA, your important work will suffer tremendously to the disadvantage of the pursuit for scientific excellence and worldwide leadership of the United States.

Ask for strong recommendation letters from very prominent people in your field (NIH funded is better) who have very similar work as yours and who can "very strongly recommend, vouch and support without reservations that Ms Chigirl is a person of exceptional ability in her field and that losing her to a US worker with lesser training, skills and abilities is unacceptable and would severely impact the advancement of her field to the disadvantage of America's continuing progress and sustained leadership in the scientific world."

If you can fulfill the above, chances are, you do not need a labor certification, which is the purpose of NIW. All you need to add is that you are not applying for the NIW to circumvent the labor certification but you deserve the privilege of NIW because you cannot be let go from America.

Good luck!
 
Hello,
Does anyone here had experienced with alternate arrangement? I submitted my NOS application to CFO already and I feel like they are going to say no to my request. Right now I am getting ready on the process of Alternate Arrangement. If I may asked how did you guys state your reason in your letter?. Are all the documents related to it still needs to be authenticated again in our embassy here in US?
Thanks guys.. God Bless
 
Hi Galantry!
I became a Jvisa holder after 7 years on H1B. I did not go through the orientation with CFO from the Philippines as I've been a teacher in the US since 2007.
My DS 2019, expiring Feb 2017 states i am subject to the 2 year residency, the box checked was government funded, although I am on earning my salary and not really funded.
I also did not hold a teaching post in the Philippine prior to coming to the US. We were OFWs from the Middle east when I was offered an H1B teaching job here.
What do you think about my case and chances of getting an NOS? Thanks sa tips!

Schatz
 
Hi Galantry!

I'm currently a J1-visa holder as a teacher, which is in the skills list. I'm about to complete 1/3 of my program and I'd to already like to proceed with applying for the NOS. However, I read in the CFO website that I need to have first completed 2/3 of my program before my application can be processed. Is this a golden rule? Because I've heard from somewhere that the NOS can be filled even in your 1st year. Thanks and hope to hear from you soon.

Choipogz
 
Choipogz said:
Hi Galantry!

I'm currently a J1-visa holder as a teacher, which is in the skills list. I'm about to complete 1/3 of my program and I'd to already like to proceed with applying for the NOS. However, I read in the CFO website that I need to have first completed 2/3 of my program before my application can be processed. Is this a golden rule? Because I've heard from somewhere that the NOS can be filled even in your 1st year. Thanks and hope to hear from you soon.

Choipogz
Click to expand...

Hello! My husband (Filipino) and I (US Citizen) recently submitted everything to CFO. He is in the same situation as you Choipogz and we were told that we had to meet the 2/3 rule. This is heartbreaking for us! I am looking for options to change his category and not sure what we CAN do. Praying for us.
 
Hello,

I'm running into some confusions here and hopefully someone on here can help: (I asked the PCG about these but they were not helpful, unfortunately). Questions are:
1. Apart from the birth certificate or the marriage contract, do the following items need to be authenticated by the Philippine Consulate General?
a. Copy of Certificate of Eligibility for Exchange Visitor participant (DS2019)
b. Certificate of Participation
c. Letters of support (recommendation letters, etc)

2. It says that the requirement must be submitted in three (3) separate copies. Does that mean every single copy of say birth certificate, has to be authenticated (which means all 3 copies need to be authenticated - this is ridiculously expensive!?!)? Or just have one authenticated copy of a document and make 2 copies of the authenticated document for submission?

Thanks in advance and much appreciated!
 
Hello! The items we have been asked to send in which I understand only one has to be authenticated are:

1. Authenticated copy of your Certificate(s) of Eligibility (DS 2019);
2. Authenticated copy of your Certificate of Participation that must clearly indicate the exact date of your participation and the name of your sponsoring institution based on your DS2019;
3. Authenticated copy of your Copy of your Third Party Barcode Page from the U.S. Department of State; and
4. Authenticated copy of your Marriage License with your US Citizen spouse, together with additional proofs of citizenship such as birth certificate and passport
 
Thanks, Team Mallari.

The 3rd Party Barcode Page from US is now a requirement? Since when? That is definitely not a required form to send as per the list of requirements. I thought they only need the case number for this. Please clarify.

Also, what's the best option for paying the required fee? Open to suggestions here..
 
Thanks, Team Mallari.

The 3rd Party Barcode Page from US is now a requirement? Since when? That is definitely not a required form to send as per the list of requirements. I thought they only need the case number for this. Please clarify.

Also, what's the best option for paying the required fee? Open to suggestions here..
 
Hello,

On the question on EVP form: "How was your program financed?", I find the answer options are a bit tricky.
I am not financed by any US nor Philippine Government so option 1 (government financed) is obviously not the option for me. However, should I choose option 2 (financed by a private/non-government organization) or option 3 (personally financed)?

My salary comes from the department and the research is also funded by the department. Appreciate any thoughts...
 
milk&cheese said:
Thanks, Team Mallari.

The 3rd Party Barcode Page from US is now a requirement? Since when? That is definitely not a required form to send as per the list of requirements. I thought they only need the case number for this. Please clarify.

Also, what's the best option for paying the required fee? Open to suggestions here..
Click to expand...

Hello milk&cheese! I am not sure how long this has been a requirement, but yes it is...I copied and pasted the email to the thread so it is word for word. :)

We had my husbands mother pay in person since she is there in Manila. Hope this helps!
 
milk&cheese said:
Hello,

On the question on EVP form: "How was your program financed?", I find the answer options are a bit tricky.
I am not financed by any US nor Philippine Government so option 1 (government financed) is obviously not the option for me. However, should I choose option 2 (financed by a private/non-government organization) or option 3 (personally financed)?

My salary comes from the department and the research is also funded by the department. Appreciate any thoughts...
Click to expand...

When you say your salary comes from the department, are you referring to a university? If so, is the university private or public? Public universities receive money from the government so you might need to find out where the funding is coming from to the university which pays your salary. It can get a little technical. If it is a private institution, then the answer would be option 2.

For my husbands, we said option 3 because he paid for all the expenses to get to the US...we did not base the answer on salary...we answered based on how he paid his way to get the J1 which was irrelevant with regard to the salary.
 
TeamMallari said:
Hello milk&cheese! I am not sure how long this has been a requirement, but yes it is...I copied and pasted the email to the thread so it is word for word. :)

We had my husbands mother pay in person since she is there in Manila. Hope this helps!
Click to expand...
--------
So how did you go about the receipt? Did you have your mother-in-law send the receipt to CFO? I also had another EVP question posted:

"How was your program financed?", I find the answer options are a bit tricky.
I am not financed by any US nor Philippine Government so option 1 (government financed) is obviously not the option for me. However, should I choose option 2 (financed by a private/non-government organization) or option 3 (personally financed)?

My salary comes from the department and the research is also funded by the department. Appreciate any thoughts...
 
TeamMallari said:
When you say your salary comes from the department, are you referring to a university? If so, is the university private or public? Public universities receive money from the government so you might need to find out where the funding is coming from to the university which pays your salary. It can get a little technical. If it is a private institution, then the answer would be option 2.

For my husbands, we said option 3 because he paid for all the expenses to get to the US...we did not base the answer on salary...we answered based on how he paid his way to get the J1 which was irrelevant with regard to the salary.
Click to expand...

-----
I'm scratching my head here...I'm still confused, well, yes, it is a university but the funding is not from the government - I know that for sure.. I also paid my expenses to get here. Ok, maybe the "salary" thing is confusing - I'm rephrasing the question: where should I base my answer to the original question on the form then: "How was your program financed"?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top