News Update - November 10, 2011
December 2011 Visa Chart Shows Strong Movement In China And India EB-2 Categories.
The December 2011 visa bulletin showed forward movement in most categories, with the EB-2 (Advanced degree/NIW (National Interest Waiver)) preferences for China and India jumping from 11/1/07 to 3/15/08. The monthly bulletin was largely in conformance with predictions for the first six months of fiscal year 2012 as stated in the 10/18/11 American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) /Department of State (DOS) Liaison Meeting. DOS predicted three to six weeks monthly movement for the F-1 category of unmarried sons and daughters of U.S. citizens over the age of 21, and that category moved from 7/22/04 to 9/1/04; three to six weeks for the F-2A category of spouses and unmarried children under the age of 21 of green card holders, and the category moved from 2/15/09 to 3/22/09; one or two weeks for the F-2B category of unmarried sons and daughters over the age of 21 of permanent residents, and that preference moved from 8/1/03 to 8/15/03; one or two weeks for the F-3 category for married sons and daughters of U.S. citizens, and that category moved from 9/22/01 to 10/8/01; and up to one month for the F-4 category of siblings of U.S. citizens, and that preference moved from 6/15/00 to 7/15/00. These family based predictions and results were for all countries of the world other than Mexico and the Philippines.
For the employment based categories, DOS predicted that the EB-1 category for extraordinary aliens/outstanding professors and researchers/multinational executives and managers would remain current, and it did so; that the EB-2 category would remain current except for China and India, and the form held; and that the EB-3 category would move up to one month except for China only advancing one to three weeks and India one or two weeks. For December, the EB-3 category for skilled workers or professionals went from 12/22/05 to 1/15/06 worldwide except for China moving from 8/22/04 to 9/8/04 and India from 7/22/02 to 8/1/02. For the EW-3 category of unskilled workers, the December visa chart showed movement of one-and-a-half months from 11/15/05 to 1/1/06 for all of the world except for China which remained static at 4/22/03 and India which advanced from 6/15/02 to 7/22/02. DOS predicted that both the EB-4 category for certain religious workers and EB-5 category for immigrant investors would remain current and they did so.
In looking at the DOS predictions, an important one was that with respect to expected movement for the China and India EB-2 categories, there would be significant advances up to February, but that such movement would not be the norm throughout the fiscal year, and there was a possibility for retrogression of the dates during the summer months.
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