CONWAY — When international students work longer hours at on-campus jobs than visa regulations allow, severe consequences can follow for the college or university and the students.
“A violation of status such as unauthorized employment ... is considered extremely serious,” said Audra Johnston, associate director for international students and scholars at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.
University of Central Arkansas trustee Bobby Reynolds said last week that officials are investigating whether Alex Chen, a UCA administrator, has made some international students work more than legally allowed.
Chen, associate vice president for international engagement, has been on paid administrative leave since Oct. 14 as school officials review the Office of International Programs.
Chen joined UCA in 2010. In an e-mail Saturday, he did not address any specific issues. But he wrote, “The whole case is still under investigation. ... I will respect and hope that UCA will do a fair and thorough investigation to prove my innocence and reputation. I do not want to make any inappropriate comments that may affect UCA as well as my whole family. I still have two children in Colleges. I have to be extremely careful ... not to lose my job.”
Interim President Tom Courtway has declined to discuss the matter. A text message he sent Oct. 14 to trustees and released to the
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act said, “Over the past few weeks, we have had several complaints from the Office of International Programs and, in particular, about Dr. Alex Chen.”
Visa regulations generally allow international students to work a maximum of 20 hours per week on campus when school is in session. Such students may work more when school is not in session or during annual breaks “as long as they are enrolling full-time the next semester,” according to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s website.
Off-campus work is a separate matter.
Johnston said the visa regulations limit students’ work time “to help ensure they have the majority of their time free for study and that the visa category is not abused where people come to the United States pretending to be students but really to work.”
Johnston said schools are supposed to report any students working more than their visas allow to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, whether the work takes place on or off campus.
“If Homeland Security were to review our program ... and if they determined that we knew violations were occurring and we failed to report them, that could be a cause for Homeland Security to withdraw our school’s approval to enroll foreign students,” Johnston said.
The students also can find themselves in trouble, Johnston added.
“If it comes to light that the student exceeded the number of hours per week, there are still consequences for the student, regardless [of whether] it was at the behest of someone in a position of authority,” Johnston said.
“The consequences for the students are very serious, and they’re very unforgiving,” Johnston said, referring to federal officials.
Jack Gillean, UCA’s chief of staff and interim general counsel, said Friday that UCA has not filed any reports with Homeland Security in the past year about international students falling out of compliance with visas because of work hours.
He said in an e-mail that UCA has reported five to 10 students who fell out of compliance by not maintaining at least 12 hours of course credit per semester.
Temple Black, a spokesman for the New Orleans office of the Department of Homeland Security, said he could not comment on the legal effect of UCA’s situation without more information.
Martin DeJesus, a longtime immigration attorney and criminal defense lawyer in Little Rock, said if students were “forced” to do extra work and not compensated for it, “I don’t think they’re in violation of their visa status.”
“At that point, they’re a victim,” DeJesus said.
Volunteer work would not be considered a job under visa regulations, DeJesus added.
“If they’re compensated, that’s a little different. I think it [the issue] turns largely on that,” he said.
Zhao Han, a UCA student from the Inner Mongolia region of China, said Friday that Chen asked her in March to help him by doing a promotional video aimed at recruiting international students.
“It took me a long time to edit. He didn’t understand how hard it was to get a video production done,” said Zhao, a senior broadcast journalism major.
She said she was late with the video, and, “He wasn’t satisfied with my work. So he said I’m not reliable and I’m not qualified, so he’s not paying me.”
Zhao pointed out that Chen had never promised to pay her and that she viewed her effort as volunteer work. A fellow student from the United States told Zhao that she should get paid. Still, she said, “I was scared to ask for money from him [Chen].”
“There’s a culture thing involved,” Zhao said. “I just didn’t ask for anything from him.”
She said that last summer Chen asked her to do another promotional video.
“He said, ‘Give me a presentation, a proposal about how you want to do this.’ ... But I refused after I thought about it. ... My concern was I [wouldn’t] have time.”
Chen again didn’t promise any pay, Zhao said. She recalled that Chen said, “Well, you have to show me your ability first.”
This time, she e-mailed Chen and said she would not do another video, she said, and he did not reply.
“He’s a great talker,” Zhao said. “He would brag about himself, telling the students how great he is, he had a good reputation, and we could learn a great deal from him. So he makes students want to work for him.”
Zhao said she knew Chen asked at least two other students to do volunteer work.
“That’s what he told students — that if you want to work for me, you have to volunteer first,” she said.
“Most students, they don’t understand” that they do not have to be “tested” first, she said. “They’re just trying to get as much experience as they can” for their resumes. “They’re just trying to learn something from him.”
Zhao said she knew of two Chinese students who did volunteer work for Chen for one semester without pay. She did not know their exact hours but said the earliest they got to work was 7 a.m. and that they sometimes worked late — as late as 2 a.m., though that was unusual, she said.
In Fayetteville, Johnston said she knows of cases where students have worked too much but that she did not know of any case where a faculty member had successfully persuaded a student to work illegally.
“Are there students out there working the extra hours” where supervisors are pushing them to do so?, she asked. “Probably so,” she said.
Johnston said many international students probably “would be reluctant to act in a kind of whistle-blower capacity.”
“First of all, they’re in a country that’s not their own,” she said. “Compound that ... especially if it’s someone in a position of authority [pressuring them] ... it would be unimaginable for them to think” about reporting that person.
Johnston said one solution for students who accumulate too many work hours is to leave the country, be honest with visa officials about what happened and seek reinstatement so they can return to the United States.
“Many of the students have come back successfully,” she said.
But one problem with that scenario is that it’s expensive to travel between countries, DeJesus said.
“If you have to leave in the middle of your studies, that’s even worse,” he said. “There’s no guarantee you’re going to be able to come back” because the granting of a visa is a discretionary act by the government.
Arkansas, Pages 17 on 10/30/2011