How to Stay in the United States After You Graduate

After: Summary and Slides

Thank you all for attending! I hope you keep in mind the main points of the talk:

  1. It's important to be proactive about immigration. Start thinking early about your plans (e.g. you might need to raise money for a company).
  2. There's a surprising number of creative ways to obtain a visa in the United States.
  3. Talk to the International Student Office (ISO) about OPT/CPT extensions for F1 visa. The ISO is the main resource for these extensions.
  4. Each case is different. Immigration law is incredibly complex. Advice from other people may or may not apply.
  5. You might want to talk to a lawyer about your case. Sometimes lawyers will sit down with you for 30 minutes just to evaluate if your case necessitates a lawyer.
Slides of the talk can be found here.

Quick details

The Romanian Student Association is bringing in Dana Bucin, an attorney with Updike, Kelly & Spellacy P.C., to talk about immigration options for students after graduation.
If you are an international student and would like to stay in the United States after you graduate, then this event is for you! The presentation will be followed by a Q&A session.
To attend, you must RSVP here: http://goo.gl/forms/UUfruR5Kvz
A poster for the event can be found here.

What: How to Stay in the United States After You Graduate
When: Monday, November 16th, 6:00pm-7:30pm
Where: MIT, Building 34, Room 34-101 (was Building 4, Room 4-237)
Who: Dana Bucin, Esq. (Updike, Kelly & Spellacy, P.C.)

Presentation details

There has never been a tougher time for international students to stay in the US after graduation in work-authorized status. The typical immigration journey for a foreign student after graduation starts with an F-1 student visa while in school, continues with the post-graduation Optional Practical Training (OPT) work permit and usually leads to an employer-sponsored H-1B work visa. In recent years, however, the H-1B visa has become increasingly difficult to obtain for private sector employment due to legal restrictions on the number of H-1Bs available per year and the overwhelming demand for those visas. Most recently (August 2015), a DC court invalidated the 17-month OPT extension for STEM graduates. The tragic result of these developments is that many talented foreign students (including in-demand STEM graduates) may be forced to depart the US at the end of their OPT period, unless they are much better informed about creative alternatives to the H-1B visa and OPT extension.

Immigration and Business attorney Dana Bucin will speak on the various creative alternatives to the H-1B visa, with a focus on entrepreneurship/investment-based immigration. She will describe the immigration options available to company founders, inventors, researchers, entrepreneurs and certain investors and provide guidelines on the business/ corporate structuring of the equity investments and the drafting of the Business Plan to achieve such immigration goals.

Speaker bio

Dana Bucin, a former international student herself, is an attorney with Updike, Kelly & Spellacy, P.C. in Hartford, Connecticut, U.S.A., a law firm affiliated with Meritas law firms worldwide including offices in over 80 foreign countries. As an immigration attorney, Ms. Bucin represents both business and individual clients with green card applications, work visas, entrepreneurial/ foreign investor visas, naturalization, and various other business-based, employment-based, and family-based immigration matters. The combination of Immigration Law and Business Law practice areas provides an optimal skill set which enables her to represent foreign students, entrepreneurs, investors and business professionals not only with their immigration options but also with their business/corporate set up.

Ms. Bucin has been listed as a 2013 SuperLawyer by the SuperLawyers Magazine, a 2012 New Leader in the Law by the Connecticut Law Tribune, a 2011 and 2012 Rising Star by the SuperLawyers Magazine and among the 2010 Women in the Law High Achievers by the Connecticut Law Tribune. For her leadership within the Greater Hartford Community, Ms. Bucin was honored as a "40 Under Forty" award recipient by the Hartford Business Journal in 2009.

Contact

Contact rsa-officers@mit.edu with any questions you might have.

Maps

Finding rooms and buildings is hard at MIT.
For an easier time, use our map here: http://whereis.mit.edu/?go=34