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Advice on Academic Best Practices Dr. George Corliss, MU EECE |
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Bruey on F-1 Issues
David Bruey, Director of Campus International Programs, writes: Dear Computing Student, Contact a Designated School Official (DSO) at OCIP if you have questions about your F-1 status. Your DSOs have told you that so many times that you are probably tired of hearing it. Your academic advisors and instructors care about your situation very much, and they want to help you as much as possible, but they do not understand F-1 visa regulations and do not have authority regarding your F-1 status. That is not their job. The DSOs are appointed by the President of Marquette and are then approved by the government after they meet the legal requirements to be DSOs. We do not work for the government. We have to know the regulations very well in order to do our jobs for the university and for your welfare. Sometimes students like to ask their academic advisors or instructors because they like the answers that they receive from their advisors and instructors better than the information they receive from their DSOs. However, please understand that you are responsible for maintaining your status, regardless of the sources of your information. If you do something that violates your status, it does not matter whether your advisor or instructor told you it was okay to do. You will still be out of status. The second paragraph of Dr. Corliss' message about the situation of a specific student is not correct. Especially the statement "The student's F-1 visa expires on the graduation day of the term in which 36 credits are completed" includes at least three fundamental misunderstandings. You have accurate information in the booklet "Maintaining Your F-1 Student Status", and I can tell you more detailed information and can apply information to your specific situation if you have questions. However, you may want to understand clearly that in general the important maximum ending date of your studies is not your graduation date but is your completion of your prescribed course of study. Another point to understand is that a student doesn't make up his or her own prescribed course of study. (In other words, if you decide that you would like to take a music course and your advisor says it is okay with him or her, I don't think that alone makes the music course a part of your prescribed course of study.) There are occasions when courses are added to a student's program because the department decides that the student needs that additional study for the proper completion of the program. But those are unusual cases and are not simply matters of convenience for the student or the department. Whether or not a student takes "extra" courses that are not really part of the prescribed course of study usually does not matter if the student still completes the course of study by his or her the D/S date because as a practical matter the DSOs and the immigration service have more important issues to work on. The administrative cost to review course selections would be extremely high and of little value for educational or legal purposes. It is also true that the summer period is now viewed differently in legal arrangements if a student is going to graduate in that summer. Students who want to be in status during the summer before an August graduation need to be completing the prescribed course of study in the summer, and we plan to add that summer enrollment requirement to the SEVIS record of those students and therefore require evidence of the summer studies just as we do for the semesters. In this way a student's record will be consistent and understandable within and outside of the university. The point now is that a student who finishes the prescribed course of study in the spring cannot continue in valid F-1 status until August if the only reason is that August is the official graduation date. The third paragraph of Dr. Corliss' message includes at least two fundamental misunderstandings. There are Marquette F-1 students who are in a joint Marquette-MCW program. Their individual employment situations are different than most students because their program is a fully joint program involving both institutions. However, that is a joint program for those students, not for all Marquette students. Philosophy students are not part of the joint program, and neither are Computing students. Computing is not a joint program with MCW, and I think it is clear that Computing students are not eligible to work at MCW as "on-campus employment" as if they themselves are in the joint program. There are clear criteria for students to know whether they can work at MCW as "on-campus employment", as curricular practical training, or as optional practical training. I am happy to explain those regulations in any specific case and have explained the options to numerous students. Whether money to pay a student passes through the accounting books of Marquette is usually irrelevant. The origin of the student's payment check does not change who is the employer, who is served by the employment, where the work takes place, and how the work is related to the student's prescribed course of study. The fourth paragraph of Dr. Corliss' message about dropping a course has at least four errors. You can drop courses as long as you do not become part-time. You can become part-time if you receive DSO authorization in advance, as Dr. Corliss indicated. You can receive DSO authorization only if your reason for becoming part-time is one of the listed reasons that the law allows. In addition, there are now limits on how many times you can become part-time for which reason. If you become part-time and could have received DSO permission but did not receive that permission in advance, you will be out of status, but you will be eligible to apply for reinstatement to F-1 status rather than being on your way home. With all of these "ifs" you can see why we encourage you to check with a DSO at OCIP if you need to become part-time. Dr. Corliss is correct that if a student is violating his or her status and OCIP does not know about it, the student is still out of status. The DSOs at OCIP are not the government. The university and the individual DSOs are subject to government regulations the same as you are. We do not have authority to postpone the regulations or change them or choose whether or not to apply them to you. The law does not care whether your instructor gave you wrong information or whether you did not understand something. The regulations are independent of us. If you want to know my view of your activity or your proposed activity or status, you are welcome to contact me. You are responsible for your status, and I and the other DSOs at OCIP want to help you maintain it. You are always welcome to contact me or another DSO if you have any questions about your status. I also hope you have read the new booklet about Maintaining Your F-1 Student Status that was given to you this spring at one of our group presentations about the new regulations. David Bruey
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