In the past, Chinese students applied in droves to study in science, technical, and math graduate programs in the U.S. But a tectonic shift is taking place. Now, greater numbers of Chinese are applying to study as undergraduates abroad too. Leading reasons seem to be:

* Greater wealth in China means more families can afford to send their children abroad.

* In particular, greater wealth means that families can send their children abroad even without a grad school scholarship, teaching assistant or research assistant grant to help cover tuition.

* The Chinese higher education system can’t meet the demand. Ten million students take the annual national college entrance test, competing for only 5.7 million admission slots.

* Going abroad is an alternative for students who don’t pass the college entrance test or who don’t get into their school/major of choice in China.

Chinese undergrads and graduate students in the U.S. now total about 100,000.

Read more in USA today.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that it received a sufficient number of H-1B petitions to reach the statutory cap for fiscal year (FY) 2010.  Dec. 21, 2009 is the “final receipt date” for new H-1B specialty occupation petitions requesting an employment start date in FY 2010.

The “final receipt date” is the date on which USCIS determines that it has received enough cap-subject petitions to reach the limit of 65,000. USCIS will reject cap-subject petitions for new H-1B specialty occupation workers seeking an employment start date in FY 2010 that arrive after Dec. 21, 2009.

Properly filed cases will be considered received on the date that USCIS physically receives the petition; not the date that the petition was postmarked.  USCIS will reject cap-subject petitions for new H-1B specialty occupation workers seeking an employment start date in FY 2010 that arrive after Dec. 21, 2009.

USCIS will apply a computer-generated random selection process to all petitions that are subject to the cap and were received on Dec. 21, 2009.  USCIS will use this process to select petitions needed to meet the cap.  USCIS will reject, and return the fee, for all cap-subject petitions not randomly selected.

Petitions filed on behalf of current H-1B workers who have been counted previously against the cap will not be counted towards the congressionally mandated FY 2010 H-1B cap. Therefore, USCIS will continue to process petitions filed to:

• Extend the amount of time a current H-1B worker may remain in the United States.
• Change the terms of employment for current H-1B workers.
• Allow current H-1B workers to change employers.
• Allow current H-1B workers to work concurrently in a second H-1B position.

Certain H-1B petitions are also exempt from the H-1B cap. These include foreign nationals offered employment at an institution of higher education, a related or affiliated nonprofit entity, a nonprofit research organization, or a governmental research organization. (USCIS has already received more than 20,000 H-1B petitions filed on behalf of persons exempt from the cap under the “advanced degree” exemption.)

The U.S. Department of State proposes increasing nonimmigrant visa application fees. The December 14 proposal cites an independent cost of service study finding that the U.S. Government is not fully covering its costs for processing visas.

The current fee is $131. The new fee schedule would be tiered because “the cost of accepting, adjudicating, and issuing [visas] is appreciably higher” for certain categories of visas that require a “review of extensive documentation and a more in-depth interview.”

B (temporary visitors for business or pleasure): $140
E (treaty traders and investors): $390
H (temporary workers): $150
K (fiance or fiancee of U.S. citizen): $350
L (intracompany transferees): $150
O (aliens of extraordinary ability): $150
P (artists, entertainers, athletes): $150
Q (cultural exchange visitors): $150
R (religious workers): $150
Other nonimmigrant visa classifications: $140

After the proposed fee increase was published in the Federal Register on December 14, the public was allowed 60 days to submit comments. Then the State Department will implement the proposed rule “as quickly as practicable.”

Fees were last changed effective January 1, 2008.

Reportedly an American, Julie Hamm, may be the first foreigner to avail herself of China’s petition (信访) system. This is worth mentioning on this immigration law blog because eventually applicants for Chinese visas who run into dead ends with formal legal channels will also turn to the petition system.

Carl Minzer gives a brief explanation of the petitioning system:

‘[P]etitioning’ [is] a traditional means of seeking justice firmly rooted in Chinese history. Defined broadly as an effort to “go past basic-level institutions to reach higher-level bodies, express problems and request their resolution,” petitioning includes a variety of practices that parallel, overlap, and in some cases replace formal legal channels. These practices have survived into the post-1949 People’s Republic of China in the form of citizen petitioning of numerous “letters and visits” (xinfang) bureaus distributed throughout all Chinese government organs, including the courts.

Development of a modern legal system over the past two decades has not eliminated these petitioning practices and institutions. Formal Chinese legal institutions have developed internal means of accommodating petitioning behavior. Since the 1990s, Chinese authorities have also passed a web of regulations to govern both petitioners’ practices and the operation of national, provincial, and local xinfang bureaus.

According to an AP story, Ms. Hamm turned to petitioning due to a grievance that her fiance has been unjustly jailed since June 2009 on trespassing charges.

The story points out the shortcomings of the petitioning system. Petitioners can try for years to bring their cases to the attention of Beijing authorities but get nowhere. Some are grabbed off the streets and sent home by police from their home provinces who don’t want news of local injustices reaching  Beijing. Some petitioners are even held in unofficial detention centers known as “black jails.”

Hamm has been “spared the rough treatment Chinese petitioners often receive, [but] the results are no different. She finds official suspicion, indifference and the desire that complainers would simply go away.”

I’d welcome any reader comments about whether it may be useful for a foreigner to make complaints about China visa issues through the petitioning system.