Student Union
Foreign Students Frustrated by OPT Delays
When Peter, a Muslim student from China, graduated from Texas A&M University in December 2020, he thought he would be working at a Texas consulting firm by early January.
Instead, the international STEM graduate is sitting in his apartment in Houston, waiting for the results of his Optional Practical Training (OPT) application. OPT is a temporary work visa that allows international students to extend their U.S. student visas by 12 to 36 months.
“Normally, it takes two to three weeks to get a receipt [notice] and then… it’s supposed to take about three months, to get an employment authorization document,” immigration Attorney Greg Siskind said in a video interview. “In this case, we were already hitting almost three months without even having a receipt, much less getting a decision on the document.”
Peter was eventually notified that his forms had been received by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS): 116 days after mailing them to a U.S. secure federal facility in Dallas – called a lockbox – that receives forms and applications, and processes payments. Now, he waits up to eight more months for approval.
“I don’t have income while I’m still paying the lease. I don’t have health insurance since I’m technically unemployed. My apartment had a power outage and ran out of hot water because of the massive snowstorm last week,” he told VOA in an online interview. “The waiting period is unknown. And I think in the U.S., if you want the government to fix this problem in a quick manner, you have to sue them.”
On February 16, Peter and 17 other named plaintiffs from China filed a class-action lawsuit against USCIS in the District Court for the Southern District of Ohio.
The suit demands the agency “open, process and adjudicate applications,” according to their OPTActionLogs website.
Robert Cohen, the case’s lead attorney, said there may be “several thousand” international students who are affected by the OPT delays. The students have been waiting for months, when it only should have taken weeks, he said.
“I’m one of the luckiest because my employer was really considerate and pushed my starting date,” Peter said. “But many people I know have lost their job offer due to the delays and even had to head home.”
USCIS released a formal statement January 8, acknowledging the delays, attributing them to “the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors.” It was USCIS’ first public statement since the delays began in October.
On February 26, USCIS posted a second public statement responding to the long delays, giving affected applicants a 14-month OPT period of flexibility and a chance to refile certain rejected applications.
WeChat group fights delays
OPT's temporary employment program allows international students with F-1 visas to work in their major area of study for a total of 12 months before or after graduation. Students pursuing degrees in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields are eligible for a 24-month OPT extension.
Applicants typically apply up to 90 days before completing their degree by mailing forms to one of USCIS’ lockbox locations: Texas or Arizona. The current delays have affected students applying for post-completion OPT extension; students in the pre-completion OPT program have not experienced delays.
Peter said he noticed in late November that the application receipt waiting period seemed to drag on longer than usual. Finding others in similar situations on 1Point3Acres, a Chinese community forum, he started a WeChat group chat to share their experiences with the ongoing delays. As of February 25, over 600 people had joined.
All student sources in this story have requested anonymity because they said they feared retaliation.
Managing delays
Zhang, a computer science graduate from Brandeis University in Massachusetts, said she has had to ask her manager to push back her work start date twice: first to February 15 and now to March 29.
Li, a STEM OPT extension applicant, said he had lost his job because of the delays. Denied an extension and now jobless, he has since re-applied, hoping for an approval.
Other graduates, while waiting for their employment authorization documents (EAD), worry about their lack of health insurance. Unenrolled and unemployed, many graduates are left without it.
Frustrated at the lack of active solutions from USCIS, Long, a graduate of Brown University in Rhode Island, explained that he has received the same automated responses when he emails USCIS about his delayed OPT status and delays.
USCIS
USCIS initially announced a 45-day to four-month waiting time for OPTs. But Peter said he noticed the USCIS Processing Times website updated on February 22 that an extension to “3-8 months” processing time had been made.
“USCIS has been transparent about the delays in processing and scheduling caused by COVID-19 and other external factors,” the agency stated on February 26.
“The agency has taken numerous steps to help noncitizens address immigration-related challenges during the national [COVID-19 pandemic] emergency; and USCIS will continue to explore flexibility options and stakeholder recommendations to minimize those delays,” it wrote. “The agency recognizes the ongoing impact COVID-19 has had on nonimmigrant students and the noncitizen community as a whole, and USCIS appreciates the understanding it has received over the last year.
Diane Rish, associate director of government relations at the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told VOA in January that “applicants across a wide variety of visa categories are being impacted by these receipt notice delays.” She said the delays were caused by “an uptick in filings” in general because of an anticipated fee increase, an increase in green card filings, and a favorable processing date of October 13 that encouraged another surge.
“Maybe they really run out of people processing,” Long said. “But … we’re forcing them to change by filing the lawsuit because I believe, in America, this is the only way to try to force government agencies to do anything.”
“These [delays] affect our future confidence in studying in the U.S. We first saw that the U.S. was welcoming to all the international students or immigrants from all kinds of backgrounds,” Long said.
Cautiously optimistic
While waiting for their EAD cards and the lawsuit’s result, Zhang and Long have become friends and shared their cautious optimism during the uncertainty.
“At first, I was panicking and afraid of losing my job offer and legal status in the U.S. But then I realized that it’s a massive delay, not just me,” Zhang said as she emphasized the significance of representing the international student community rather than herself. “I just want justice for the students,” she said.
Although attorney Cohen is unsure when the case will be settled, he said he is “confident” that they will reach an agreement with the government.
“We’re hopeful that that will provide relief for all the students and put the students back in the position that they would have been in had they not delayed with the receipts like this,” Cohen said.
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College athletes push for voter turnout while largely avoiding controversy as election nears
Lily Meskers faced an unexpected choice in the lead-up to the first major election she can vote in.
The 19-year-old University of Montana sprinter was among college athletes in the state who received an inquiry from Montana Together asking if she was interested in a name, image and likeness deal to support Sen. Jon Tester, a three-term Democrat seeking re-election. The group, which is not affiliated with the Tester campaign, offered from $400 to $2,400 to athletes willing to produce video endorsements.
Meskers, who is from Colorado but registered to vote in Montana, decided against the deal because she disagrees with Tester's votes on legislation involving transgender athletes in sports.
"I was like, OK, I believe that this is a political move to try to gain back some voters that he might have lost," Meskers said. "And me being a female student-athlete myself, I was not going to give my endorsement to someone who I felt didn't have the same support for me."
Professional athletes such as LeBron James, Colin Kaepernick and Stephen Curry have taken high-profile stances on hot-button topics and political campaigns in recent years, but college athletes are far less outspoken — even if money is available, according to experts in the NIL field. Being outwardly political can reflect on their school or endanger potential endorsement deals from brands that don't want controversy. It can certainly establish a public image for an athlete — for better or for worse — or lead to tensions with teammates and coaches who might not feel the same way.
There are examples of political activism by college athletes: A Texas Tech kicker revealed his support for former President Donald Trump on a shirt under his uniform at a game last week and a handful of Nebraska athletes a few days ago teamed up in a campaign ad against an abortion measure on the Tuesday's ballot.
Still, such steps are considered rare.
"It can be viewed as risky and there may be people telling them just don't even take that chance because they haven't made it yet," said Lauren Walsh, who started a sports branding agency 15 years ago. She said there is often too much to lose for themselves, their handlers and in some cases, their families.
"And these individuals still have to figure out what they're going to do with the rest of their lives, even those that do end up getting drafted," she added.
College coaches are not always as reticent. Auburn men's basketball coach Bruce Pearl has used social media to make it clear he does not support Kamala Harris, Trump's Democratic opponent in next week's presidential election. Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy once caused a stir with a star player for wearing a shirt promoting a far-right news outlet.
Blake Lawrence, co-founder of the NIL platform Opendorse, noted that this is the first presidential election in the NIL era, which began in July 2021. He said athletes are flocking to opportunities to help increase voter turnout in the 18-to-24 age demographic, adding that one of his company's partners has had 86 athletes post social media messages encouraging turnout through the first half of the week.
He said athletes are shying away from endorsing specific candidates or causes that are considered partisan.
"Student-athletes are, for the most part, still developing their confidence in endorsing any type of product or service," he said. "So if they are hesitant to put their weight behind supporting a local restaurant or an e-commerce product, then they are certainly going to be hesitant to use their social channels in a political way."
Giving athletes a voice
Many college athletes have opted to focus on drumming up turnout in a non-partisan manner or simply using their platforms to take stands that are not directly political in nature. Some of those efforts can be found in battleground states.
A progressive group called NextGen America said it had signed players in Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Virginia to encourage voting among young people. Another organization, The Team, said it prepped 27 college athletes in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona and Michigan to lead volunteer voter participation opportunities for students. The organization also said it got more than 625 coaches to sign a nonpartisan pledge to get their athletes registered to vote.
The Team's executive director is Joe Kennedy, a former coach who coordinated championship visits and other sporting events at the White House during President Barack Obama's administration. In early October, it hosted a Zoom event during which panelists such as NCAA President Charlie Baker and WNBA players Nneka Ogwumike and Natasha Cloud gave college athletes advice about using their platforms on campus.
In its early days, The Team seized upon momentum from the record turnout seen in the 2020 election. The NCAA that year said Division I athletes could have Election Day off from practice and play to vote. Lisa Kay Solomon, founder of the All Vote No Play campaign, said even if the athletes don't immediately take stands on controversial issues, it's important for them to learn how.
"It is a lot to ask our young people to feel capable and confident on skills they've never had a chance to practice," Solomon said. "We have to model what it means to practice taking risks, practice standing up for yourself, practice pausing to think about what are the values that you care about — not what social media is feeding into your brain, but what do you care about and how do you express that? And how do you do it in a way that honors the kind of future that you want to be a part of?"
Shut up and play?
Two years ago, Tennessee-Martin quarterback Dresser Winn said he would support a candidate in a local district attorney general race in what experts said was very likely the first political NIL deal by a college athlete.
There have been very few since.
The public criticism and fallout for athletes who speak out on politics or social issue can be sharp. Kaepernick, the Super Bowl-winning quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, hasn't played in an NFL game since January 2017, not long after he began kneeling during the national anthem at games.
Meskers, the Montana sprinter, said political endorsements through NIL deals could create problems for athletes and their schools.
"I just think that NIL is going to run into a lot of trouble and a lot of struggles if they continue to let athletes do political endorsements," she said. "I just think it's messy. But I stand by NIL as a whole. I think it's really hard as a student athlete to create a financial income and support yourself."
Walsh said it's easier for wealthy and veteran stars like James and Ogwumike to take stands. James, the Los Angeles Lakers star, started More Than a Vote — an organization with a mission to "educate, energize and protect Black voters" — in 2020. He has passed the leadership to Ogwumike, who just finished her 13th year in the WNBA and also is the president of the Women's National Basketball Players Association. More than a Vote is focused on women's rights and reproductive freedom this year.
"They have very established brands," Walsh said. "They know who they are and they know what their political stance is. They know that they have a really strong following that -- there's always going to be haters, but they're also always going to have that strong following of people who listen to everything that they have to say."
Andra Gillespie, an associate professor at Emory University who teaches African American politics, also said it is rare that a college athlete would make a significant impact with a political stand simply because they tend to have a more regional platform than national. Even celebrities like Taylor Swift and Eminem are better at increasing turnout than championing candidates.
"They are certainly very beneficial in helping to drive up turnout among their fans," Gillespie said. "The data is less conclusive about whether or not they're persuasive – are they the ones who are going to persuade you to vote for a particular candidate?"
Athletes as influencers
Still, campaigns know young voters are critical this election cycle, and athletes offer an effective and familiar voice to reach them.
Political and social topics are not often broached, but this week six Nebraska athletes — five softball players and a volleyball player — appeared in an ad paid for by the group Protect Women and Children involving two initiatives about abortion laws on Tuesday's ballot.
The female athletes backed Initiative 434, which would amend the state constitution to prohibit abortions after the first trimester, with exceptions. Star softball player Jordy Bahl said on social media that the athletes were not paid.
A University of Montana spokesperson said two athletes initially agreed to take part in the NIL deal backing Tester. The school said one withdrew and the other declined to be interviewed.
For Meskers, deciding against the offer boiled down to Tester twice voting against proposals to bar federal funds from going to schools that allow transgender athletes to play women's sports, a prominent GOP campaign topic. Tester's campaign said the proposals were amendments to government spending packages, and he didn't want to play a role in derailing them as government shutdowns loomed.
"As a former public school teacher and school board member, Jon Tester believes these decisions should be made at the local level," a Tester spokesperson said. "He has never voted to allow men to compete against women."
Meskers said she believes using influence as college athletes is good and she is in favor of NIL. She just doesn't think the two should mix specifically for supporting candidates.
"I think especially as student athletes, we do have such a big voice and we do have a platform to use," she said. "So I think if you're encouraging people to do their civic duties and get up and go (vote), I think that's a great thing."
