Date: Tue, 2 Sep 2003 06:47:46 -0500

From: "Droleskey, Suzanne M" <Sdroleskey@TAMU.EDU>

Subject: Address Updates

This is simply a reminder that all international students are required by federal regulations to maintain up to date addresses in two ways. If your records are not up to date, this is considered a violation of your legal status in the US.
        1. Keep your address up to date on BONFIRE (note: BONFIRE will be replaced in early October with a new web-based system that will be easier to use -- watch for information about this). You will only be able to keep the local address up to date, if the permanent address outside the US changes, let someone at ISS know and it can be changed on your behalf. You can send this information to ISS at iss@tamu.edu, subject line "Permanent Address change". The local address information will be automatically reported to SEVIS in the nightly data uploads.

As a reminder, you cannot list a post office box in the local address  field on BONFIRE (or the new system). To meet the federal requirements for reporting in SEVIS, the address must be a physical address where you live in the local area (Bryan/College Station, etc.). If you are on OPT or registered in absentia but still in the US, you need to list the local address in the US where you live. The "local address" field in BONFIRE cannot list a foreign address.

2. Complete and mail in the AR-11 form to the federal government at the address listed on the form. The AR-11 form is available on the ISS website at http://international.tamu.edu/iss under the tab for "forms". This form is supposed to be mailed in within 10 days of changing addresses.

Remember: each time you change addresses, keep this information up to date in both of the two ways mentioned above. ISS never wants one of our students to have to do a reinstatement to legal status because of an address not having been kept up to date.

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End of ISSNEWS Digest - 30 Aug 2003 to 3 Sep 2003 (#2003-46)

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From:       Droleskey, Suzanne M [mailto:Sdroleskey@TAMU.EDU]

Sent:      Thursday, June 26, 2003 6:22 PM

Subject:      Impact of Downloading Music from the Web

International Student Services wants to alert you to the following information.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) announced yesterday that they will be filing several hundred lawsuits in the next few weeks against people who illegally download music from the Internet.  Previously, RIAA has only targeted corporate entities who do this, but now they are targeting individual people.  One of the groups of people they plan to focus on   appear to be university students.  Students on other college campuses have already been caught running illegal websites for music sharing or sharing music through other means.  Individuals identified in such activities could be liable for thousands of dollars in damages as well as being arrested and potentially convicted of a crime.

International students are reminded that if you are arrested in the US, the police will automatically initiate a notice of your arrest to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).  The division of DHS that investigates these issues is the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (BICE).  BICE is the same division that oversees SEVIS.  Once BICE initiates an investigation, they will examine far more than the issue of music theft.  They could examine every facet of your program and stay in the US.

Please exercise caution in your choices as you download of elements from the web or re-examine what information is currently

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Travel and Visa Renewal over the Summer Vacation

 International Student Services understand that many students may have questions about travel and visa issuance over the upcoming summer vacation. We have prepared the following information to help you decide what to do when making plans to travel inside and outside of the US.

 If you have additional questions after receiving this e-mail, please do not hesitate to contact us at ISS. We will also release further updates of information as soon as we have them. If you would like to receive these updates electronically and are not already receiving them on our listserv, please let us know that you would like to be added to the listserv. You may do this by calling and giving us your e-mail address over the phone (845-1824) or by e-mailing your request to iss@tamu.edu <mailto:iss@tamu.edu>. Please make your e-mail subject line say "Add to ISS Listserv".

 If you would like to see other listserv messages that have been sent in the last few weeks on similar topics, these are posted on the ISS website. The web address is <http://international.tamu.edu/iss>.

 1. General Travel Information

 If you have plans to travel outside of the U.S. during the summer vacation, please make sure that your Certificate of Eligibility (I-20/IAP-66/DS-2019) is endorsed for travel before you leave and that the travel signature will still be valid upon re-entry. Travel signatures on I-20s are generally valid for one year, and signatures for the IAP-66/DS-2019 will be valid until the listed date, given on the back of the form.

 If you are returning after August 1, 2003 or if you need a new visa to return to the U.S. your old documents will no longer work. You must obtain a SEVIS I-20/IAP-66/DS-2019 with a barcode on the right side, prior to your departure. All your F-2/J-2 dependents must also have a separate document for themselves.

 If you need to have your Certificate of Eligibility endorsed for travel, it can be done up to 30 days before your planned departure date. Please fill out the F-1 or J-1 travel request form, which can be picked up in our office or found on our website at http://international.tamu.edu/ISS/isshandouts.html. You will need to submit this form at our reception desk, along with your original I-20/IAP-66/DS-2019, passport, visa, and I-94 (for you and any dependents). You will also need to pre-register for the Fall 2003 semester. If you are a sponsored student and your Certificate of Eligibility was issued by Texas A&M University, the travel request form must also be signed by the Sponsored Student Programs Office. If you are a sponsored student and your Certificate of Eligibility was NOT issued by Texas A&M University, then please contact the sponsoring agency that issued your document to obtain the appropriate travel signature.

 The process of reviewing a student> '> s records to verify legal status usually takes 3-4 days. Remember that many students travel at this time, and ISS processes documents as they come in, so the longer you wait, the longer the queue will be. This is why we recommend that you plan on submitting your documents at least one to two weeks before your scheduled departure date.

2. Upcoming Travel and SEVIS documents

 If you have already attended one of the SEVIS sessions but your SEVIS document was not issued yet and you need one to travel (reminder: you need a SEVIS document to travel if you need a new U.S. visa to return OR you will travel and return to the US after August 1, 2003), please let our office be aware that you have not received the SEVIS document yet. Please send an e-mail to International Student Services iss@tamu.edu . Please use the following subject heading in the e-mail so we can quickly identify these e-mails: "SEVIS travel document request". In the body of the e-mail provide the following information for the F1 or J1 AND for any impacted dependents:>

 Last or Family name:
 First or Surname:
 TAMU ID number (if known and if applicable):
 Date of impending travel:
 Date of proposed return:
 Will you apply for a new visa stamp?

 A copy of your electronic ticket information and/or a scanned copy of the airline ticket information (We apologize for including this last item, but we have unfortunately had several students make requests for emergency issuance of SEVIS documents who were not actually in an emergency situation, but simply trying to find a way to move themselves to the front of the SEVIS work queue. ISS WILL be sure that everyone has a SEVIS document by August 1, 2003, and we will appreciate your cooperation to help us manage this workload.)

 3. Processing Delays

 Please keep in mind that, if you are planning to leave the United States during the Summer vacation, and you need to apply for a new visa while outside the U.S., you may face delays in renewing your student visa. Seven countries are now designated by the U.S. government as state sponsors of terrorism: North Korea, Cuba, Syria, Sudan, Iran, Iraq, and Libya. In addition, significant delays in visa issuance may occur if you are from one of the following countries: Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen. If you are from one of these countries, it is not advisable to travel outside of the US during summer if you need a visa to reenter.

 Consulates and embassies are more frequently conducting background checks on individuals from these countries and individuals in certain technical fields, resulting in significant delays in visa processing times. For Fall 2002, delays ranged from a month after the visa interview at the consular post to as long as three months in certain cases. The US Department of State has indicated that they believe the delays have been significantly reduced now, but still suggest that it might routinely take at least an extra month to process some visas if additional security background checks are conducted.

 All students need to remember that there are potentially four separate processing reviews that could take place before a visa is issued, depending on your situation. They are as follows:

 1) CLASS (Consular Lookout Automated Support System) that matches names with criminal records. This process can take about 30 days.

 2) MANTIS, that uses the Technology Alert List (TAL) to review people studying in certain fields. This one was clogged down during Fall 2002 and many students under this review took much longer than the 30 days promised to obtain clearance to be issued visas.

 3) CONDOR, that was established after Sept. 11, 2001, is focused on identifying terrorists. This was also backlogged in summer and fall 2002, and took additional time beyond the previously promised 30 days. This was also a manual process that has now chnaged to an electronic one, so it should be faster for Fall 2003.

 4) IPASS (Interagency Panel on Advanced Science and Security), that was conceived in Spring 2002 as a way to respond to a Presidential Directive issued in October 2001. This process is new and hopefully will not duplicate any of the above processes, but it is unknown how this will impact visa issuance for Fall 2003.

 Recommendations have been made to the federal government to eliminate the duplication in these four processes, so hopefully, things will be smoother for Fall 2003, but there is no way to know for sure what will happen, so all students should prepare themselves for potential delays if applying for visas.

 4. Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or SARS

 Students traveling from or through Mainland China and Hong Kong may face additional delays and they should closely monitor the website of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention http://www.cdc.gov and the website of the World Health Organization> http://www.who.int> at www.who.int for the latest information on SARS.

 After reading through the above information, if you still feel it is necessary to travel abroad AND you need to renew your visa before returning to the US, be sure to check with the consulate or embassy where you will be applying to find out about their anticipated processing times and/or new processing procedures.

 You should also be aware that the US government has added SARS to the list of diseases that can cause someone to be stopped and placed in quarantine, even against their will. So, if this disease continues to spread, students travelling in from SARS impacted countries may face medical screening in the US or in connecting countries as well as delays related to this.

 5. National Security Entry-Exit Registration System

 The National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS) became effective on 9/11/02, and can apply to any foreign country national or citizen entering or exiting the US. It also applies to some nationals or citizens of several countries who are already in the US, and that list has changed twice since NSEERS has been implemented. Specific countries impacted are listed here: Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Egypt, Eritrea, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, North Korea, Pakistan, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, or Yemen.

 It is important to be aware that being requested to register with NSEERS at a US port of entry may affect your travel plans because the registration process can take time (one to several hours, depending on the number of people waiting to be processed), and such a delay may cause you to miss a connecting flight. Please schedule your flights accordingly.

 If you are selected to be registered in the NSEERS system you will be interviewed and fingerprinted at the US port-of-entry. This is what will cause the delay in making a connecting flight to another US destination. Nonimmigrants in the NSEERS system are also required to "register" with law enforcement authorities and notify an INS officer when they leave or re-enter the U.S. When a nonimmigrant is initially registered, they will be given a list of airports, seaports, or land ports to use to leave the U.S. Please note: All special registrants MUST depart ONLY though one of these designated ports of departure.

 For detailed information check the INS website at http://www.ins.usdoj.gov/graphics/lawenfor/specialreg/index.htm .

 6. Travel Inside the U.S.

 International students are reminded that they need to be sure and take passports, I-20s or IAP-66/DS-2019s, and I-94 cards with them as they travel in the US (particularly via airplanes or when near the US borders). As you have read in newspapers, there are spot checks of immigration documents even in locations not near a border. We have had Texas A&M students stopped and detained at checkpoints in South Texas, and be forewarned that officials at these checkpoints are not accepting faxed copies of documents from ISS as evidence that you are a student. If you are detained because you did not carry your paperwork with you, you will have to contact someone in College Station and convice them to drive to where you are detained, get your house keys and instructions from you about where your documents are, drive back to College Station to get the originals, and then drive back to you to get you out of detention.

 However, it is equally important to be sure that you keep in a safe location a notarized photocopy of your passport in case you lose the original. In the US, a notarized copy is considered a valid, legal copy of the original. Jennie Norris, in the International Student Services office can notarize documents for international students. This is a free service and everyone is urged to have a notarized copy made before you travel. Having a notarized copy can prove valuable if you need to prove your nationality while applying for a new passport after > losing the original one. (Remember that the ISS office will be very busy during the month of December and January, so if you decide to request notarized copies, please do so as soon as possible)

 As always, if you have additional questions about this information, please do not hesitate to ask. And, remember, this time of year is very busy at ISS with students asking for many types of services. In addition ISS is under an extreme stress to produce all international students and their dependents SEVIS documents (about 4,000 pieces) before August 1, 2003. Please be patient with us as we work to provide everyone with the assistance that they need.

 Margit E. Garay
 Assistant Director
 International Student Services

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Dear F-1 and J-1 Students,

Please read below, the latest update and requirement concerning the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS). 

 Please read this even if you already have a SEVIS document!>

 About 1000 students have signed up for and attended a SEVIS session to date.  Unfortunately, ISS has only been able to issue about 400 SEVIS documents so far.  This is because of the time consuming process of hand entering information into SEVIS, sometimes multiple times because the nation-wide system is crashing and data has to be re-entered.  In addition, sometimes the SEVIS system doesn't process the information sent, so we have to start over again.

 Because ISS has to issue all F and J students and dependents a SEVIS I-20 or DS-2019 no later than August 1, 2003, staff have been working on a way to make this go faster.  So, again, we need your help.

 In order to help speed up the process of getting a SEVIS I-20 or DS-2019, we have created a web portal where you can review and update some of your personal data yourself and help us eliminate data entry errors and the difficulty we have been having with some people's handwriting on the forms we have been using to date.  We request that all F and J students complete the on-line SEVIS Compliance form at <https://sevis.tamu.edu/>.  Please complete the on-line form even if you have attended a previous SEVIS session AND even if you already have a SEVIS document.

 When you go into the web portal, you will be asked to enter your neo account.  Doing that will bring up a screen that already has some information automatically filled in for you with as much of the data that we have.  Please review all the data to be sure it is correct and enter applicable missing information into the empty fields.

 We appreciate this help, and hopefully this will speed up our side of the process so we can get more documents issued.  Unfortunately, we cannot guarantee that SEVIS will be faster or more efficient in accepting information and producing documents.

 For those who have not yet attended a SEVIS session, please follow the appropriate instructions below:
Students at IBT, Galveston, or who are on OPT, CPT or Academic Training outside of College Station
 If you are not able to attend a SEVIS session because you are outside the College Station area, please follow these steps.
 1.    Complete the SEVIS Compliance form on-line at <https://sevis.tamu.edu/>.
 2.    Mail the following items to SEVIS Compliance

 International Student Services
1226 TAMU
College Station, TX 77843-1226

 *     Photocopies of ALL your I-20s or DS-2019/IAP-66s (copy front & back of each and make sure that the entry date and stamp are legible.)
 *     Photocopies of your passport (copy the picture page, the current expiration page, the visa page)
 *     Photocopies of your I-94 card (copy front & back and make sure that the entry date and stamp are legible.)
 *     Photocopies of your dependents' passports (copy the picture page, the current expiration page, the visa page)
 *     Photocopies of your dependents' I-94 cards (copy front & back and make sure that the entry date and stamp are legible.)
 *     Any new documents you might have that ISS may not have copies of (recent assistantship letter, new financial statements, major or degree level change, etc.) that need to be reflected on your SEVIS document.

 3.    Once we have received your information, your SEVIS application will be placed in the queue for processing.  We will send notification that your SEVIS I-20 or DS-2019 is ready to your NEO account and will mail it to your mailing address.  BE SURE YOU GIVE US A MAILING ADDRESS THAT WILL BE VALID FOR AT LEAST 2 MONTHS.  When you receive your SEVIS I-20 or DS-2019, please sign it and mail back a photocopy of the signed document.

End of ISSNEWS Digest - 1 Apr 2003 to 3 Apr 2003 (#2003-21)

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International Students Services

 International Student Services (ISS) needs your help to determine the size of a problem related to students and dependents with SEVIS I-20s and IAP-66s who try to obtain visas at US embassies and consulates.

 ISS has received information that there may be problems concerning access to the SEVIS information. Some US consulates can't see if a person is in SEVIS; therefore, they are unable to issue new visas or renew expired visas to these individuals. If you hear news like this from your friends overseas or if you experience such a problem, please let us know what countries and which consular posts. Send that to iss@tamu.edu and put in the subject line  " SEVIS problem overseas" . We have already identified several countries where the US consulate has occasionally had this problem (i.e. Brazil Zimbabwe, South Korea, Turkey, PRChina.)

We will be sending this information forward to the SEVIS technical people to try to resolve the problems. Unfortuantely, US embassies and consulates will not accept faxes or letters from us as proof that an individual is in SEVIS. They must see the SEVIS data themselves through the computer system. Therefore, it is important to notify the SEVIS technical support whenever this happens so we can hopefully get the problems fixed as soon as possible.

 Margit E. Garay
Assistant Director
International Student Services

International Student Services recommends that international students who are planning to travel outside the US during upcoming months consider carefully the potential impacts and disruptions that may cause problems before you finalize your plans.

A. Should you need a new US visa to return to the US, your visa issuance might be delayed for several weeks, thus causing anxiety and monetary loss.

1. Due to current world tensions, there are a few US consular posts that are cutting back in non-essential personnel. This could disrupt visa issuance services in some countries. Also, visa issuance regulations are stricter than in the past. Denial of a visa application or an inability to access consular services may prevent you from returning to the US.

2. Getting a new US visa in Mexico and Canada is very difficult. Besides the federal government's reluctance to issue visas to third country nationals, there may be a new problem to consider related to health issues. For example, on March 26, the Government of Ontario declared a provincial emergency due to the emergence of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). See more under #B and under Canadian Health Organization, http://www.health.gov.on.cal. For further information on travel to Canada, please consult the Department of State's Consular Information Sheet, available on the Bureau of Consular Affairs home page at http://www.travel.state.gov . The website of the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa, Canada is http://usembassy.state.gov/canada.

3. There seems to be difficulty at some consular posts concerning SEVIS. Some US consulates can> '> t see if a person is in SEVIS; therefore, they are unable to issue new visas or renew expired visas. Sending faxes or e-mails from ISS to the US embassy or consulate will not work to get someone a visa if this happens.

B. The Center for Disease Control has suggested that nonessential travel to mainland China and Hong Kong; Singapore and Vietnam, should be postponed until further notice due to the health problem caused by SARS. Depending on what happens in relation to this, entry to the US or other countries might be delayed or denied in the future to individuals travelling from countries identified as problem areas. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) are tracking SARS's origin and method of transmission as well as determining how its spread can be contained. In light of the continually evolving nature of the geographic spread of SARS, you should regularly consult the CDC website http://www.cdc.gov/ http://www.cdc.gov and the WHO website http://www.who.int/ for updates. Students who are currently in or planning to travel to SARS-affected areas of Asia should consult the Department of State's Fact Sheet on SARS http://travel.state.gov/s_syndrom!

e_factsheet.html as well as information provided by those governments of impacted areas. US Public Announcements,

Travel Warnings, and Consular Information Sheets for China, Hong Kong,

Singapore, and Vietnam are available at the Consular Affairs internet web site at http://travel.state.gov .