Paths to Permanent Residence in Higher Education

Advanced Degree Worker/Labor Certification (petition by employer)

• Advanced degree means any United States academic or professional degree or a foreign equivalent degree above that of baccalaureate. An employer must go through the Labor Certification process. A labor certification is a finding by the Department of Labor (DOL) that there are not sufficient U.S. workers in the geographic area of employment who are able, willing, qualified (or equally qualified, in the case of college and university teachers) and available to do the job in question, and that the employment of an individual will not adversely affect the wages and working conditions of similarly employed U.S. workers.
• Special Handling for College and University Teachers: Labor Certification regulations allow college and university employers of college and university teachers to use the results of the employer's own competitive recruitment procedure. The regulation also allows such employers to select the individual if he or she is more qualified than any U.S. applicant. ISSS prepares special handling Labor Certification petitions for Tenure-Track faculty.

National Interest Waivers (NIW)  (petition by employer or self-petition)

• National Interest Waivers (NIWs) are used to exempt the position from Labor Certification and allow a person to self-sponsor for immigrant status. Although an employer may serve as the petitioner for an NIW, a job offer is not required. (The “waiver” refers to the ability to waive the Labor Certification/job offer requirement if USCIS deems a waiver to be in the “national interest.” Labor certification is the process of proving there are no qualified, willing, and able U.S. workers for a position.)
• An applicant for a national interest waiver must prove:
  1. The proposed endeavor has substantial merit and national importance;
  2. The foreign national is well-positioned to advance the proposed endeavor; and
  3. It would be beneficial to the United States to waive the labor certification requirement.
• To meet the third prong of this test, the foreign national must be distinguished from the hypothetical minimally qualified U.S. worker:
  1. By presenting a record of past achievement (e.g., a track record of accomplishment) that would reasonably lead to tangible benefits to the national interest; or
  2. By demonstrating that he/she is playing a key or critical role in a project that will yield tangible benefits and is national in scope.