Grande Antilles

Tanvee, You don’t have to do the OPT in twelve consecutive months. You can apply for OPT prior to complete your degree to do summer job (full or part time) and off campus employment related to your studies for up to 20 hours a week while school is in session. It will be a Pre-completion Practical Training. Time used in pre-completion practical training is counted towards the total 12 months that are available for your OPT . Part time Pre-completion Practical Training is counting as half time in calculating how much OPT eligibility you have left. For example, if you have two months of authorized part-time Pre-completion OPT, that would count the same as one month of full-time OPT used, leaving you with 11 months of remaining OPT to be used either prior to completion of your course of study or for post-completion practical training.

das222

If I go for grad school immediately after undergrad, will my OPT be invalid?

mohak

for phd ya research is good but for ms only whats the case?

Grande Antilles

Yes, your OPT is automatically cancelled when you move to another education level but you will be eligible for a new OPT when may become eligible for another 12 months of OPT when he or you move to a higher educational level ( even if you had used the 12 months you had for your first OPT)

Someone asked what they mean by highly skilled workers. I don’t if anyone else already answered but it means that the workers excel so much in what they are doing that the outcome of their work make the US companies more efficient and more competitive. So for example, if you have a college degree, you will be seen as a skilled worker compare to someone who only completed HS. If you can make 10 notebooks in ten minutes while another worker who hold a degree equivalent to yours is working for the same company ( or for a competitor) can only make 5 or less notebooks during this frame of time, then you are the high skilled one. Both of you has good skill but you are the one who is boosting the company’s production and make it more efficient.

Grande Antilles

Loathed, If you are a student completing the first academic year of study (or are in a one year program), the earliest you can submit the application is 90 days prior to the date you complete your first academic year. If you are beyond the first year of study, it’s better if you submit your application no earlier than 120 days prior to the start date you request for your OPT. You are eligible for OPT while you are in a community college and you can complete your OPT right after you are done with the CC if you want. However, your OPT will be end if you transfer to another school or to a more advance level of education. I know that the application for OPT cost $340 but it might be higher than that because the USCIS can change it without notice. I thought that you would still have the OPT if you transfer to a four year college but it understandable that you will lose it when you transfer because you will be moving to a higher level of education. ( BA is > than AA, right?).

Does anyone know if you lose the OPT even if the transfer is done from a 4 year college to another 4 year institution?

b@r!um

I would be surprised if a community college student would get extra OPT when transferring to a 4-year college. After all, the two years for an AA are the same as the first two years of a Bachelor's degree. But hey, this is just a gut feeling - don't take my word for it.

I am not sure what you mean by "losing OPT". When you transfer from one college to another, you don't regain any OPT you have already used at the other college but you don't lose any either.

To come back to the topic of highly skilled workers: in the context that it originally came up ("DHS: 17-Month Extension of Optional Practical Training for Certain Highly Skilled Foreign Students") it referred to foreigners with Bachelor degrees in STEM subjects. Usually when DHS or USCIS use the term "highly skilled", they refer to a subset of Bachelor degree holders - it has nothing to do with how productive people actually are.

Grande Antilles

By losing your OPT , I mean not being able to do your OPT even if you completed before you transfer or not.

Why should CC student get extra OPT? They won't get it because they transfer to poursue a higher degree of education. It is the same thing as if you transfered from Undergrad to Grad. However the student won't get a new OPT.

With productivity, I was just giving an example outside of the Box. I guess that you maybe did not read when I said that to my refernce with the Bac.. degree

take a chill pill girl

Grande Antilles

By the way, if a company want to keep you for a longer period, they won't do it because you have a certain degree. They will do it because you are better in what you are doing than other coworkers or maybe because you are doing a good job but are getting paid less than local people who could do the same thing as you for a higher wage. Still outside of the box

Grande Antilles

Rister I did find it strange that they would add the study Abroad to OPT till I read the detail on the DH’s site because I am planning on spending two consecutive semesters abroad. Oh yeah you should definitely write the introduction of the ABC of English.

b@r!um

"take a chill pill girl" - Lol...

I am still not convinced about that CC OPT deal _but I might be wrong_. I understand that your OPT time starts over when you start working on a higher degree - I am just wondering if an AA degree counts as a stand-alone degree for OPT purposes or if it is viewed as part of an undergraduate degree. Or in other words:
4 years at XYZ college => BA and 12 months of OPT
2 years at a CC and 2 years at XYZ college => BA and 24 months of OPT???
It seems unfair to the students who are attending a 4-year college right away but maybe the world just isn't fair in that respect.

In fact I interpreted your "highly skilled worker" scenario differently. To me it sounded like you were saying:
If you have a college degree, you are a skilled worker.
If you have a college degree and are more productive than other workers with the same degree, you are a highly skilled worker.

I really appreciate out-of-the-box thinking but not in the context of immigration and labor laws.

loathed

so if you transfer from a community college to a university, you lose your 12 month community college OPT right?

but since you've transferred to a 4 year BA uni course, do you gain another 12 months?

or do you not just lose it altogether?

b@r!um

loathed, the first part of your question is exactly what I have been questioning.

What I can tell you is that you either get another 12 months once you transfer or the remainder of your CC OPT time will carry over to the college. You will NOT lose your OPT eligibility altogether.

b@r!um

I want to add another comment about the OPT for unpaid employment internship issue. I meant to post this a while ago but I lost the link.

DHS regulations say that you need OPT to pursue off-campus employment, but what exactly is considered employment? Unfortunately I have not been able to locate a definition of employment at the DHS or USCIS websites, but since they usually define critical terms precisely, I would be surprised if there were no definition of employment hidden somewhere. For the time being several college websites define employment for OPT and CPT purposes as follows:
Employment Options for F-1 Students

Using that definition of employment, most unpaid internships would require a work authorization.

Grande Antilles

“I am just wondering if an AA degree counts as a stand-alone degree for OPT purposes or if it is viewed as part of an undergraduate degree." I am intricate by it too . I don’t understand why they would do such a thing to CC students if they transfer to another school. “( BA is > than AA, right?)” If you see a question mark after one of my notes, it means that the question was not answered thus it needs more explanation.

Bar!lum and Loathed this is what I found on the DHS ‘s site.”
(B) “Termination of practical training. Authorization to engage in optional practical training employment is automatically terminated when the student transfers to another school or begins study at another educational level.” Optional Practical Training

“transfers to another school”? Now the problem is that it does not say if they consider a Bachelor degree higher than a AA nor if by transferring they mean students from a community college or students who transfer from a 4 year college to another 4 year institution.

Loathed, are you in the US? You could ask your international advisor about it if you are attending a CC. I think that the best answer about the transfer question would be from DHS, an international advisor or students who have been in this situation. You should also do some research on the IRS ‘s site too.

My definition for High skilled worker outside of the box does not really need your approval because it’s just my opinion. Your are not an officer of the DHS nor an employer so I guess that it’s not worth arguing over this because as far as I know none of us are the policy makers for DHS or prospective employers, and no matter how we define HS skilled, the employers and DHS will have their own definition of it.

“I really appreciate out-of-the-box thinking but not in the context of immigration and labor laws.” I don’t remember anyone saying that this is how HS W is defined in terms of immigration and labor

It’s good that you took the chill pill because you interpreted my post as bible verses – while I never claimed any absolute true behind them.

Grande Antilles

When an undergraduate student goes to graduate school, the OPT that he has when he was pursuing the Bach.. degree expires but he got a new one when he goes to graduate school. So even if AA was considered as < than Bach - I am not saying that it is- so why wouldn't the CC student get a new OPT too given that a Bach student gets a new one when he goes to grad?
Does any of you know the answer?