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Published Nov 28,2016 By Harsha Kalathur

Hello,

I am a postdoc in Canada. I finished my PhD from the US in 2015. I have had a very difficult time landing full-time jobs a=other than this postdoc. I want explore which option would be best for me, EB1 or NIW? I have contacted an immigration attorney before through a mutual friend and he felt my CV as is would be hard to qualify for a self-petition. However, if I have a job offer or an organization to volunteer for and can prove that I am indispensible, then I may qualify for a NIW. But that still requires a job offer basically. I want to be able to apply for jobs as a greencard holder. Plus, my experience in the US has been very unique in that I lived with an American family all my 7 years there. Their neighbors and friends know me very well. I just wish I could make use of my unique experience in addition to my PhD/Postdoc credentials. I consider my experience extraordinary because of how rare it is and how that helped me adopt the American way of life.

I appreciate your thoughts and suggestions on this.

 

Thank you.

Harsha

 

Posted in Suitable Category NIW/EB1A
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Tigran Kalaydzhyan
Tigran Kalaydzhyan
7 years ago

Hi Harsha,

Please read about the EB1A and EB2-NIW criteria from this website. Roughly speaking, if you can prove that you are among the very top specialists in your field and your research is used widely nationally and internationally, then EB1A is more suitable for you. If you can show that your work will greatly benefit the national interests of the U.S., then you can try NIW. There is another important difference though: if you happened to be born in India or mainland China, then even if your petition for NIW is approved, there is a long waiting time (several years), until you can apply for the adjustment of status.

> However, if I have a job offer or an organization to volunteer for and can prove that
> I am indispensible, then I may qualify for a NIW. But that still requires a job offer basically.

NIW does not require a job offer. If your future employer decides to sponsor the NIW, then they still have to hire a lawyer (unless they have one in the organization) to prepare the case. Unless this new job is directly related to the U.S. national interests, this may not change your current situation regarding the eligibility. Also being “indispensable” for an organization does not automatically make a person eligible for NIW (please see examples on this website and in the free e-book).

> I consider my experience extraordinary because of how rare it is and how that helped
> me adopt the American way of life.

Unfortunately, being accustomed to the American life does not help in obtaining the green card in the self-petition categories. Please see the descriptions of the categories at this website or by the links below
https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/permanent-workers/employment-based-immigration-first-preference-eb-1
https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/permanent-workers/employment-based-immigration-second-preference-eb-2

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