Ask Me Help Desk - F1 student - I20 expiring - OPT applied

Quote:

Originally Posted by rajaijah

guys.
I am a PhD student in F1 (expired) visa. My I-20 is exp July 31st and I have applied for OPT with a start date of Aug 1st. I might get my OPT probably around 15th of Aug given the time line it takes for OPT processing nowadays.

I am defending on Aug 3rd and will be submitting my dissertation by Aug 7th to my univ. The deadline for Aug graduation has passed so I have to graduate in Dec 2008.

I have a job starting on Aug 14th as a teaching faculty and they will process H1 for me after few months.

My queries are:

1. Since my I-20 is expiring do I have to get it renewed since I am going to graduate only in Dec 2008. Or since I have applied for OPT with a start date of Aug 1st I should be okay.

Acc. to my Univ. international affairs it is okay for my I-20 to expire since I am defending with a week and finishing up soon after and only pending is hooding ceremony in dec.

2. Do i have to register for Fall 2008 to keep my status or since I applied for OPT I dont have to. I just dont want to go out of status and jeopardize my immigration status.

According to my univ International affairs and also grad center I dont have to register for Fall 2008 even though I will be graduating only in that semester bcoz I will be done with everything even before 1st day of classes (aug 27th). Are they right? I just want to make sure with someone here bcoz often times international affairs dont know few things and I dont want to end up in trouble bcoz of their negligence.

(I hope I have given all details to explain my situation better. IF anything missing please let me know)

If you already get a job offer thru OPT, you don't need to maintain I-20, BUT if you have been approved for OPT and unable to find a job, then you may need to extend I-20.