Non-USA citizen with USA nursing education

sunnyjohn · Nov 11, 2005

Hello ErKANTARIK,

I am sure Suzanne will be around to help you shortly. She is a great resource. Here is a thread that she started a while ago taht was made into a sticky. It has great tips for your situation.

https://allnurses.com/forums/f75/international-nursing-students-the-us-119024.html

fero · Nov 11, 2005

Hello. I am happy to have found this forum and greet everyone here. My situation is somewhat unique and I have been getting conflicting advice, so I would like to hear from another source. Thank you in advance, Suzanne.
I am a Turkish national who is in the USA on an F-1 visa. I am completing the third semester of a four semester Associate Degree program in New Jersey. I anticipate graduating in May 2006 and have decided that I would like to become licensed as an RN here in the United States with the ultimate goal of becoming a CRNA on the masters level.
I presume that my first step is to graduate and pass the NCLEX and then locate an employer who will sponsor me for a green card. I have been trying to make contacts among my clinical instructors as well as among nurses in the hospitals where I have been doing my clinical work as a nursing student.
Could you kindly spell out the steps that I should follow to achieve my goals, seeing that I am a non-American national, but one whose entire nursing education will have been completed here in the USA.
Thanks in advance...

hey Erkan.I am from Turkey too and working on getting my RN license. I can help you. I went through all the process. If you have any question, PM me.

Basarilar..:)

suzanne4, RN · Nov 12, 2005

Welcome to Allnurses.com.:balloons:

And guess what, you are not unique, there are quite a few as you can see from reading the posts here that are studying in the US.

You will be required to get a Visa Screen Certificate, this cannot be done until you have a completed set of transcripts. It is available thru CGFNS.

The only thing that is waived for you are the English exams, otherwise, you still need to go thru the full immigration process, etc.

I suggest that you apply for the OPT so that you will be able to begin work right after you graduate. Talk to your advisor at school about that. You must apply for it before you graduate.

Yes, you will need a hospital that will be able to give you a letter of offer for employment. The rest is usually done by the immigration attorney.

Which part of NJ are you currently in?

erkantarik · Nov 13, 2005

Suzanne.. Thanks for your information. It would seem appropriate that with the degree of need for RNs in the USA, that the process for non-US citizens who have completed their nursing studies in the USA would be streamlined so as to eliminate some of the steps to obtain a green card -- I mean US-educated rather than foreign-educated. Currently, what is the processing time for approval of the OPT? And, if I am an OPT status am I allowed to leave the US and then return without any problems, as I have been doing on my current F-1 (I-20) visa? If my OPT is approved prior to my starting to work, will the time allowed on the OPT start only upon my acceptance of employment? Lastly, presuming that I pass NCLEX on the first attempt, will I be allowed to work as an RN rather than a GN; I guess my question is whether licensure as a NCLEX-certified RN a totally different issue from immigration status? Will a H-1B visa be the way to go if I do not have a green card after the expiry of the OCT? Sorry for so many questions, but I have gotten so much rumor-based information rather than the accurate information posted in this forum. By the way, I am in Burlington County in NJ. Thanks again, Suzanne....

suzanne4, RN · Nov 14, 2005

First, H1-B visas are not currently open to nurses and I hope that they never will be. You do not get piad the same rate as an American nurse with that, yet it now has the same requirements as you need for a green card.

You are stream-lined for a green card just by the virtue of being an RN. For other professions, it is about five years on average. The only thing that you need to do for immigration is take the NCLEX exam, the English exams are waived. Because you do not hold a US passport, you must go thru the Visa Screen Certificate process, but this is also much faster for you because your school is in the US.

The OPT can only be applied for while you are still a student, if you wait until after you graduate, you will not be able to get it.

Once you pass the NCLEX-RN exam, you are an RN, you will no longer be a GN.

Licensure an an RN is completely different from immigration, one has nothing to do with the other, except that immigration requires that you pass NCLEX before you will be granted the Visa Screen Certificate.

And leaving the country is not an issue, but you probably won't have time to initially after you graduate, as new grad programs begin soon after you graduate. In some states, if you do not start then, then you will not be able to start for another six months. Your orientation is going to keep you busy enough, and by then all of your immigration things should be completed.