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RN GREEN CARD FOR INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED NURSERN green card is one reward for being successful in the board exam. By virtue of your RN license, you and your family now qualify for the occupational visa, RN green card. Other documents that you will need in the course of your visa processing are: • Evidence of a US based employer who will sponsor your green card. This comes in the form of RN job offer and notarized letter from this employer. You present the notarized letter at the embassy at the time of your visa interview. In case you are doing this program all by yourself, you may need an RN travel company at this time. The agency will become necessary to you because of the above requirement. Or you must directly contact a hospital which will be willing to sponsor your visa. Very few hospitals will do that and it is not easy to find and convince one. • The next requirement is a VSC (visa screen certificate). You also present this at the embassy at the time of your visa interview. It is one important document for the occupational visa acquisition. To obtain this, your agency submits an application to ICHP (international commission on healthcare professions), a division of CGFNS. Accompanying this application are transcripts for your RN training program (to be sent in directly by your school), high school education diploma/certificate and verification of your registered nursing licenses (for US RN & first RN).These are also sent directly to ICHP by the licensing authority. And the last document for the VSC is a proof of you having passed an English proficiency test (IELTS/TOEFL, etc). The English proficiency test is waived for registered nurses who meet the exemption criteria. Having obtained the above documents, your agency begins the process of acquiring a green card for you and your beneficiaries. Your beneficiaries here comprise of a spouse and biological/legally adopted children under age 21. The immigration team of your agency will advise on all needed documents for each applicant/beneficiary. The next step is where your employer/agency (usually with the green card application and supporting documents) petitions an office of USCIS (United States citizenship and immigration service) for an occupational visa for you. Upon approval of this petition, USCIS notifies you and forwards your file to NVC (national visa center). Your agency/employer, on your behalf, communicates directly with the institutions involved in this exercise. This is because you have appointed your employer who is also the petitioner as your “choice of agent”. But you are regularly updated on the day-to –day activity of the RN green card/visa processing. The duration for approval of a petition varies from one USCIS office to another, and sometimes depends on the time of the year and workload on that office. It can take few months to a year or more. Having gotten your petition approved, you then submit visa fees in bankers draft for yourself and each family member through your agency. The agency forwards the fees to NVC on your behalf. A nurse recruiting agency will usually not pay for your visa fees.
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