scrubbedexpat099

Lot of benefits in going the internal transfer route.

Pulaski

I dispute that!

Sri Pete

> (i) You can't apply for a visa from within the US, ever.

I am probably being overly picky in mentioning this but I believe that, technically, this is untrue. I applied for and obtained a student visa while I was in the US. Mind you, this was decades ago...maybe things have changed.

scrubbedexpat099

Interesting

Which consulate did you get it from?

Sri Pete

I got it from the INS (Immigration and Naturalization Service, as it was then). No consulate was involved.

Jerni

Did you do a change of status at the time? Perhaps you arrived on a tourist visa?

Noorah101

INS / USCIS does not issue visas. Perhaps you just changed your status.

Rene

ian-mstm

No, it's not.


A visa is a travel document only. You can't get a visa while inside the US. Why? Because you're already inside the US and a visa is a travel document.

It's more likely that you received a change of status.


Visas are issued by the US Department of State... not by the (former) INS. Neither INS nor USCIS issue visas.

Ian

Nutmegger

If it was truly decades ago -- in the 1970s -- you couldn't come to the US without a visa, so you would have changed status.

Sri Pete

What I had was indeed a change of status as I entered with a tourist visa that I obtained at the consulate in Edinburgh. I always understood it and talked about it as a change of visa but maybe I was wrong to do so. Thank you for clarifying the terminology for me. I remain puzzled however because, during my years as a student in the US, I left and re-entered the country several times so whatever I got must have served as a travel document too, no?

ian-mstm

What was the validity period of the visa... 5 years? 10 years?


Without having a specific F-1 visa, it's possible that you entered on a tourist visa each time (assuming the visa itself was still valid) but you thought you were being admitted as a student. If that's the case, then you were going to school illegally in the US - because you were never actually admitted in F-1 status. You would have been fine during the time between the initial change of status (COS) and the moment you left the US the very first time after the COS... but thereafter, if you didn't have an F-1 visa, you should not have been attending school. If you did have an F-1 visa, then you got it at a US Consulate abroad between the first time you left the US after COS and the next time you entered.

Since, from what you've written, this all happened well before 3/1/03... I shouldn't worry about it now - although some people will likely be furious that I've just made that comment.

Ian

MarylandNed

I suggest a working holiday visa in Canada.

International Experience Canada – travel and work in Canada

scrubbedexpat099

I am familiar with a similar scenario in the UK, could not be bothered to get a Student Visa and entered as a visitor.

Sri Pete

I have no memory of how long my tourist visa was valid for or of whether or not I ever had an F-1 visa in my passport. This all started over 45 years ago. In retrospect, from what you say, it does seem possible that I was illegal in some way although I certainly never either intended to be nor had any notion at the time that I might be. Indeed this is all a rather shocking revelation to me.

Pulaski

They were more innocent times.