Niece wants student visa

[esun41]

I just browsed this topic of student visa's (F and M) It is new ground for me and my wife is talking bringing her niece over on a student visa. She does not want to stay as an immigrant. The Dept. of State website was pretty vague and I saw an outdated (May, '05) topic here on CFL.

 

Any experiences or advice on procedures or timelines would be appreciated.

 

Thanx

[Randy W]

We have a number of people at work who took that route. For the most part, they got a bachelor's degree in China and then came to the US for their graduate studies. I think the hard part is to get accepted to an American school. The timing now is different (post 9-11), so I'm not sure I could help you there.

 

My understanding is that it is a single-entry visa (no trips home), and you are employment authorized. You are allowed a year after graduation to find a job with a company willing to sponsor you for a green card (or, of course, to return to China).

[Stone]

If her niece is a top-notch student or she comes from an extremely wealthy family in China, then the whole process is relatively painless: (1) Seek admission to a U.S. college; (2) Provide evidence of financial resources; (3) Obtain the visa forms from the U.S. college of her choice (4) Go to the nearest U.S Consulate to obtain a student visa.

 

If she is an outstanding student with excellent academic records, securing admission and scholarship / graduate assistantship from a top-rated U.S college is relatively easy. Getting a student visa (F-1 visa) is also not difficult, if she already had admission and scholarship/assistantship, say from University of Texas at Austin or better yet Princeton. On the other hand, if she is just an average student but with substantial family financial resources, she might just apply for an expensive but not difficult to get in U.S. college. And then once she gets the visa form, she needs to prove to the Visa Officer of her family financial resources and ties to her home country. As a rule of thumb, U.S. welcomes people with either talents or money, because talented people make the country more competitive and big money spent here creates jobs.

 

Unlike the immigrant visa process, once she applies for a student visa with all documents ready (visa form, passport, admission letter, test scores, financial records and academic records, etc), she can usually get the student visa within just a couple of weeks.