Hello,

I recently received my PhD in Biomedical Sciences. I am interested to immigrate to Australia. Anyone has an experience in such a case? Do I require working experience, or my PhD studies will be considered enough?

Thanks a lot!
Have a nice day
Hussein

Hi,
I have received my PR visa around 6 months ago as a Life Scientist nec.
You first need skills assessment from VETASSESS (http://www.vetassess.com.au/) and you need at least a Bachelor degree and 1 year of work experience to get a + result. If during your PhD you were paid a salary and you had a job contract you can claim it as work experience. If you were on scholarship it might be more complicated, however you should check Vetassess website - they have some instructions regarding this.
If your PhD is from overseas, you should also ask Vetassess for assessment if you want to claim points for it (20 points for PhD; 5 more than for BSc).
Two states currently are sponsoring Life Scientists: Victoria (no experience required for PhD graduates (http://www.liveinvictoria.vic.gov.au...ate-nomination)) and Queensland (http://migration.qld.gov.au/wp-conte...t-190-visa.pdf).
You probably also need to get a good score in IELTS as you won't be able to claim points for skilled employment (just guessing).
If you can get positive skills assessment, pass IELTS, get a nomination from the state and score at least 60 points in skillselect, you can apply for the 190 visa. For me all together it took around 6 months from when I received positive skills assessment and until I received my visa. Good luck!

Hi Joanna,

Thanks a lot for sharing your experience with me. In my case, the work experience evaluation seems to be bit complicated. Actually, during my PhD studies I had a tax-free salary. I don't know if they consider this as an employment or scholarship. In Europe, PhD regulations lie in between employment and grants, certainly different from those in Australia. I will e-mail VETASSESS to ask about my case.
In your opinion which is a better choice VIC or QLD in terms of low cost living and job offers?
Thanks again for your very informative and clear answer
Have a nice day

From Vetassess website:
"In order to consider employment undertaken whilst completing a PhD for Points Test purposes, the employment would need to be paid, at least 40 hours per fortnight and the tasks performed should be at the required skill level and highly relevant/closely related to the nominated occupation. PhD research tasks which are unpaid, or paid a stipend or scholarship cannot be assessed for employment under the Points Test Assessment."

I don't think there is any point in emailing Vetassess (they only respond with very general answers), but you can use their advisory service (http://www1.vetassessadvisory.com.au/SRGO/Online/) to check if you will be able to get a positive assessment. I also did my PhD in Europe (Germany) but my salary was taxable and I was employed as a Researcher, had a normal work contract, pay slips etc and Vetassess had no problems with this.

I think it might be easier to get SS from Qsl as Vic is really picky in choosing people to nominate.

It's hard to say regarding jobs, as it changes quickly and when you finally arrive in Aus it may be completely different. The budget for medical research looks good for the next few years, even though there were some cuts. I live in Sydney where the costs of living are very high and Melbourne is quite similar (do not know Qls), but the postdoc salary here is quite good so I wouldn't worry

Hello Joanna,

Thanks again for your reply. Indeed, I will contact the advisory service. It is a better way before launching the procedure. I also had contract and payslips, but still not very sure if they will consider my working experience. It is a pity if not

You mentioned that you are in Sydney, is it possible to live in Sydney if you applied for a different state nomination program?

Greetings and thanks again!

Hussein

With 190 visa you can live anywhere in Australia. I couldn't find a job in the state that sponsored me (Victoria), so I moved to Sydney where I have been working for the past few months as a postdoc.

Hi Joanna,

Good to know that you have received your PR visa. I am a clinical research professional planning to apply under life scientist nec category in Victoria,but after reading a lot of posts regarding rejection from Victoria, I am a bit worried. Don’t understand what are the exact requirements of Victoria for this category.

If you don’t mind sharing, can I request you to share the job description which you mentioned while applying and getting positive result from Victorian government.

This will help me a lot.

Thanks

Hi,
I am a postdoc researcher in Genetics/Cancer Research, so I don't think my experience will help you...

You are supposed to use your own job description not somene else's

So you can forge one??

Haven't been on here for ages. The last comment has just reminded me why!!! Pleasant and friendly as ever!!

Eh - I find people helpful, pleasant and friendly when someone posts a genuine or sincere query.

When people come looking for ways to flout the rules and then get called on it, well that's just the breaks.

Your mileage may vary.

I have no interest in being pleasant or friendly to people that want to cheat their way to a visa .. and really there is no other reason why anyone would need somebody else's job description.

If you want to set up a website for people seeking ways of obtaining a visa through unscrupulous means, well knock yourself out.

The poster concerned was clearly looking to use someone else's job description instead of his own.
BE does not condone anything of that kind, as it amounts to visa fraud and is illegal.