USA

 While international students are eligible to work in the US for 12 months on a student visa, also known as Optional Practical Training or “OPT” (and those graduating from STEM-related programs, i.e. science, technology, engineering and math, were recently granted an additional two year extension for a total of three years), after their OPT runs out, these students must be sponsored by an employer for an H1-B visa in order to remain in the country. However, finding employers who are willing to sponsor these temporary work visas is incredibly challengingOne reason is that there is no guarantee that the application of sponsorship will be granted by the US Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) since it is a completely random selection process, hence why it is referred to as a lottery system. Thus, the employer is taking a gamble when hiring an international student since they may or may not be able to retain that worker beyond one year if hired. The total number of H-1B visas issued annually is capped at 65,000 with an additional 20,000 set aside for advanced degree holders, i.e. master’s degree or higher, bringing the grand total to 85,000 H-1B visas issued each year. With close to 1,000,000 international students in the country, one can quickly see that the numbers simply do not add up.

The great irony is that the vast majority of international students decide to study in the US expressly because they desire to work and remain the US upon graduation. Far more often than not though, students only come to the realization that this might not be logistically feasible far too late in the game. So while career services staff try their best to assist these students with their US-focused job searches, we must also help students figure out a “Plan B” or alternative option. One of these options is inevitably returning to their home country. But of course, the challenge here is that often US universities do not have relationships with employers in students’ home countries, although this is now changing. For example, at the University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business, staff from Career Services now visit China annually with the express purpose of cultivating relationships with employers there and building recruitment pipelines. Many other schools have also begun to devote resources to similar efforts