RFE and list of my response

As I promised, I'm posting the RFE from NSC-CIS and the list of my response to RFE

RFE from NSC-CIS:
Matter of New York State Dept. of Transportation, 22 I&N Dec.215 (Comm.1998) has set forth several factors which must be considered when evaluating a request for a national interest waiver. Fist, it must be shown that the alien seeks employment in an area of substantial intrinsic merit. Next, it must be shown that the proposed benefit will be national in scope. Finally, the petitioner seeking the waiver must establish that the alien will serve the national interest to a substantially greater degree that would an available U.S. worker having the same minimum qualifications.

1. Submit Form ETA-750 A & B “Application for Alien Employment Certification” certified by the Department of Labor. The ETA-750 must have been certified by the Department of Labor before the filing date of the petition.

a. You must provide evidence which addresses your eligibility under each of the following:
b. Provide evidence the benefits of your proposed employment will be national in scope. Your employment may be limited to a particular geographic area. However, you must establish benefit to more than a particular region of the country. Moreover, there should be little or no adverse impact on the interests of other regions of the country.

c. Submit evidence you seek employment in an area of substantial intrinsic merit. You employment must be important to the national interests of the United States. Additionally, the benefits of your employment should be immediately apparent to the national interests of the United States.
d. Submit evidence related to your ability to perform the duties of the proposed employment position. To be considered in the national interest you must make a showing significantly above the necessary to prove the “prospective national benefit” required to all aliens seeking to qualify as “exceptional”. Exceptional is defined under Service regulations as …”a degree of expertise significantly above that ordinarily encountered in the sciences, arts, or business.”

2. You must persuasively demonstrate that the national interest would be adversely affected if a labor certification were required. You must demonstrate that if would be contrary to the national interest to potentially deprive the prospective employer of your services by making available to U.S. workers the position you seek. If self-employed, you must also establish the national interest would be adversely affected if a labor certification were required.

a. You must establish you are not seeking a national interest waiver based on a shortage of qualified workers in a given field, regardless of the nature of the occupation. The national interest waiver is not warranted solely for the purpose of ameliorating a local labor shortage.
b. If you demonstrate that you hold a patent or are responsible for an innovation, then you must demonstrate that the specific innovation serves the national interest.
c. You must establish you have a past record of specific prior achievement, which justifies projections of future benefit to the national interest. You must establish, in some capacity, your ability to serve the national interest to a substantially greater extent than the majority of your colleagues. You must demonstrate to some degree your influence on your field of employment as a whole.

PLEASE NOTE: the evidence initially submitted with this petition does not satisfactorily demonstrate the alien’s eligibility for the benefit requested. A great degree of discretion resides within a national interest waiver determination. With the evidence request below, the Service is not attempting to indicate that the items below are regulatory requirements, but rather, are evidentiary suggestions that would clearly demonstrate to the examining official the alien’s qualification for classification requested. Counsel and /or the alien may respond to any or all of the items identified, or, present comparable evidence that adheres to regulatory intent.

Please do not submit duplication copies of the evidence that has been previously submitted.

3. You have not adequately demonstrated that an employer’s pursuit of a labor certification on your behalf would adversely impact the United States. The Service is aware of the numerous hurdles presented by the labor certification process. However, the national interest waiver was not designed to rectify the shortcomings of the labor certification process.
a. Provide documentation that any of your work or other initiatives have become accepted as an industry standard and that you have been credited for the development.
b. Other than research grants, travel grants, scholarships, and/or fellowships, provide evidence of significant awards that you have received as a result of your individual efforts, i.e., Nobel, Burger, etc. Awards should be accompanied by evidence that establishes the reputation of the organization granting the award, the significance of the award, and the criteria used to select the recipient.

The criteria presented should include statistical information regarding how many awards of a similar type were presented at the same time/same year the alien received his award(s), and identify the total number of individuals against whom the alien competed as an award recipient.

c. Provide additional evidence, from individuals outside your prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances, which validates your individual contributions and/or professional ability as being original and EXCEPTIONAL.

The Service is especially interested in seeing articles from professional journals that specifically talk about you and the significance of your career discoveries. Again, articles that simply reference your research within a footnote or bibliography are not acceptable. Again, the Service would like to see article that are specifically written about you and the value /quality of your work.

d. Submit evidence which clearly demonstrates that you are one of the foremost leading authorities within your field and that your personal performance has/will SUBSTANTIALLY influence, above and beyond that of any other researcher.

Or identify and describe the specific breakthroughs for which you have been individually recognized and which have positively impacted U.S. health care, the environment, economy and/or other initiatives.

e. If applicable, present evidence that any of your associated patents have been broadly commercialized or have at least reached the testing stage. If applicable, identify the scope/size of the associated surveys and present the statistical and economical results of the studies conducted.

f. You might specify what consequences would occur if you were able to continue your participation in the activity. (Substantiate all claims with supportive documentation)
g. What have you individually accomplished in the field that can be considered significant from a production or implementation standpoint, as opposed to just research associated with grants or a doctoral thesis?
h. How would/has your participation in the program or activity have/had a greater impact than others in the field?
i. Would your absence bring research, testing, and /or development efforts to a standstill or negatively impact U.S. health care and the environment? Again, claims should be substantiated with supportive documentation.

4. Submit a letter that specifies how you intend to continue to serve and work in the area that is claimed to be in the national interest.

In closing, the record does not persuasively demonstrate that the national interest would be adversely affected if a labor certification were required. You must establish that you have a past record of specific prior achievement, which justifies projections of future benefit to the national interest. You must establish, in some capacity, your ability to serve the national interest to a substantially greater extent that the majority of your colleagues, you must demonstrate to some degree your influence on the field of endeavor as a whole.

List of my response to RFE:
LIST OF ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE

Section I: Response to Request for Evidence from both applicant and employer, statistical data about XXX and an article about XXX from Newsweek.

This section is to provide a response to The Request for Evidence from applicant, employer, and other sources that are not directly related to this application to establish the eligibility of the applicant for NIW based on the NIW guideline. The letter from Dr. xxxx (direct employer) claims: “The benefits brought by this project will be large and immediately apparent to most Americans…Dr. yyyy is fully qualified for the category of NIW, therefore, employer’s pursuit of labor certification is not only unnecessary, but could also potentially deprive employer of his service since it requires much longer time and he is already in the 4th year of his H1B visa, which would be contrary to the National Interests”.

1. Response to Request for Evidence (Exhibit 1)

2. A Letter from Dr. xxxxx (direct employer) (Exhibit 2)
Dr. xxx is professor and head of xxxx

3. Statistical data about xxxx and xxxxxx (Exhibit 3)

4. An article about xxxx (an agent for xxxx treatment) from Newsweek (Exhibit 4)


Section II: New manuscripts and publication during the past few months

This section is to provide new evidence to show the exceptional ability of the applicant in the past several months after initial submission. Significant progress in research was made evidenced by two new manuscripts being accepted and reviewed by prestigious journals. This is solid evidence to show the exceptional ability of the applicant in such a short time.
1. xxxxxxxxxxxx, Accepted by xxxxx. Second-authored, in press (Exhibit 5)
2. Impact factor of xxxxx (Exhibit 6).
3. Updated publication: A first-authored paper has been formally published by xxxxxx in May, 2005. The published version is presented in Exhibit 7.
4. Updated impact factor of xxxxx (Exhibit 8).
5. Another new first-authored manuscript titled “xxxxx” has been submitted to the xxxxx. Because the manuscript is still being reviewed, it is therefore not presented here. Submission evidence and the impact factor of this journal are presented in Exhibit 9.


Section III: Reference letters from Experts

This section provides 7 letters from experts outside and within my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances to provide a fair, extensive and convincing evaluation of the value/quality of the work, ability and potential future contribution of the applicant. Four letters (exhibits 10-12,14) are from individuals “outside my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances” to meet the requirements from the Request for Evidence. three letters are provided by individuals within my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances, who give comments from different angles that might not be reached by individuals “outside my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances”.

1. Reference from Dr. xxxx (Exhibit 10)
Dr. xxxx is an xxx professor, xxxx, xxxx Laboratory, Department ofxxxx, University of xxxx and a well-recognized expert in the field of xxxxx research. Dr. xxxx is “outside my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances”.

2. Reference and CV from Dr. xxxx (Exhibit 11)
Dr. xxxxx is an associate professor at xxxx. He is an expert in the field of xxxx research and published over xx papers in various prestigious journals, including xxx, xxx, xxx, the three top scientific journals in the world. Dr.xxx is “outside my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances”.

3. Reference from Dr. xxxx (Exhibit 12)
Dr. xxxx is Professor of xxx and a member of the Editorial Board for Journal of xxx . Dr. xxx is also “outside my prior and immediate circle of colleagues and acquaintances”.

4. Reference and Biographical sketch from Dr. xxxxx (Exhibit 13)
Dr. xxxx is a Full professor and Head of The Department of xxx,xxx. He serves as an Ad Hoc reviewer for xxx. His current research funding from xx approximates $xxxx.

5. Reference and CV from Dr. xxxx (Exhibit 14)
Dr. xxxx is a xxx and xxx at xxxx, and has worked as xxx at different laboratories. He has published over xx papers in prestigious journals and has x patents. He has evaluated my work based on my publication, CV, grant proposal. We’ve never met each other.

6. Reference and Biographical sketch from Dr. xxxx (Exhibit 15)
Dr. xxxx is a xxx xxxx at xxxx, who is a xxxx and a recipient of multiple awards and have supervised many research associates, graduates and undergraduates.

7. Reference and CV from Dr. xxxxx (Exhibit 16)
Dr.xxx , a xxxx at xxxxx, used to be involved in part of my work and know my personality and my ability of research, who therefore can evaluate my work and status in detail.


Section IV: Detailed process of publication of XXX manuscript and its impact

Identification of xxx is one of the most important breakthrough in the field of xxx research in recent years. This section provides detailed information about the publication process of my xxx work and its impact. Since we even don’t know the reviewers’ name, the comments from them are not intentionally used for immigration petition, which make the comments very objective, clearly demonstrating the value/quality and impact of my work. This is only one example of my many publications.

1. Reviewers’ comments on xxxx manuscript (xxxx) prior to publication (Exhibit 17)
The reviewers’ duty is to criticize the manuscript, to find potential problems. This is why the reviewers comments are called critiques. The reviewers’ names are totally unknown, therefore the comments are quite objective. The positive comments from the two unknown peer reviewers (well-established expert in the field) clearly demonstrate the quality and value of the work.

2. Response to Reviewer’s comments (Exhibit 18).
This is a letter to address all the questions asked by the peer reviewers and editor.

3. Acceptance notice by xxxx (Exhibit 19).
This is the formal acceptance of the manuscript for publication.

4. Editor’s intention to publish the manuscript in Highlight section of xxxx (Exhibit 20).
Only selected papers are published in this section, demonstrating the high value of the work.

5. Invitation to write a review from the Editor of xxxx due to the publication of xxxx work (Exhibit 21).
This demonstrates the significant impact of the publication. It immediately caused attention not only from some labs (Exhibit 2, 10-12), but also from editors.

6. Citation of the published xxxx paper (Exhibit 22).
Generally, citation occurs a few months or a year after publication. When I initially submitted my petition, although there were many citations about my previous work, but there were no citations of this new publication. During the past several months, a new citation occurred. This is another piece of evidence showing the impact of this work.

7. Sequences of xxx gene submitted to GENBANK, which could be cited globally (Exhibit 23).
This is the first time to identify this new gene, therefore, the sequences have never been reported before, I submitted the sequences to GenBank, other researches all over the world can really use the sequence for their research, again demonstrating the extensive impact of the work.


Section V: Detailed application process of xxxx grant fellowship.

This section provides detailed application process of my xxxx grant fellowship, which gives detailed information of the grant, demonstrating excellence or exceptional ability of the applicant, considering the strict criteria in reviewing the proposal. Interestingly, even at that time (2001), I wrote “xxxx”, showing my clear commitment to xxxx xxx research. In the past few years, I have done exactly what I said in 2001 (see Exhibit 28 for detail).

1. Criteria of xxxx grant fellowship (Exhibit 24).
Copy of application requirements. The criteria of grant review is highlighted.

2. Grant proposal and application: xxxxx (Exhibit 25).
Funded by xxxx in 2002-2003. I was the Principal Investigator of this project.

3. Notice of successful application (Exhibit 26).

4. Final report upon successful completion of the proposed project (Exhibit 27).


5. Candidate career goals and objectives and Project Supervisor Statement at that time (2001) (Exhibit 28), clearly demonstrating my commitment to xxxx research even at that time. This is also part of the application.


Section VI: New Grant Proposals

This section provides information about what I’m going to do in near future. All the projects proposed are in National interests. The first proposal, in which I’m a principal investigator, is highly evaluated in almost all of the references written by experts in this field.

1. Grant proposal 1:xxx , submitted to xxxxx (2006-2008) (Exhibit 29).
I’ll be the principal investigator of this project. This proposal addresses xxxxx, which is very ideal, feasible and promising. The xxx could be the best xxx agent we ever had and well evaluated in most of the references presented in Section III.

2. Grant proposal 2: xxxx (2006-2009) (Exhibit 30).
Xxxxx is reviewing it now. I’ll be the co-investigator of this project.

3. Grant proposal 3: (2006-2008) (Exhibit 31). Xxxx , submitted toxxxx.
I’ll be the co-investigator of this project.


Section VII: New Citations

During the past few months, 8 new citations of my past publications occurred as evidenced by e-mail notices by ISI, showing the continuous and extensive impact of my published work. Citation number is an well-recognized standard to evaluate the impact of somebody’s published work.

1. New citation 1. (Exhibit 32)

2. New citation 2. (Exhibit 33)

3. New citation 3. (Exhibit 34)

4. New citation 4. (Exhibit 35)

5. New citation 5 (Exhibit 36)

6. New citation 6 (Exhibit 37)

7. New citation 7 (Exhibit 38)

8. New citation 8 (Exhibit 39)



Section VIII: Future Plan

This is response to the last question of the Request for Evidence. It might be interesting to compare this future plan with my “career goals and objectives” written in 2001, which is presented in Exhibit 28. My future plan is consistent with previous my commitment. I will continue to work hard to develop xxx agent for xxx, which will benefit the all potential xxx patients.

1. Letter from myself: regarding future research plan (Exhibit 40)

2. An article about xxxx and xxx from ABC news (Exhibt 41), showing the benefit of xxxx and xxxx research.

所有跟帖： 

• 回複：RFE and list of my response -lovewind- ♀ (194 bytes) () 09/09/2005 postreply 13:04:09

• 回複：RFE and list of my response -15028- ♀ (58 bytes) () 12/09/2005 postreply 14:28:47