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H-1B Foes Challenge Bush Administration In Court
theodp writes "Computerworld reports that the Bush administration's recent decision to extend the amount of time foreign nationals can work in the U.S. on student visas is being challenged in a federal lawsuit by H-1B visa opponents. The suit, filed in US District Court by the Immigration Reform Law Institute and joined by The Programmers Guild and other groups, charges that the administration — acting through the Department of Homeland Security — exceeded its legal authority with a no-notice-no-comments 'emergency' rule change that extended the Optional Practical Training work period from one year to 29 months. Critics say this is little more than an effort to skirt around the H-1B cap limit. Because extended stays are limited to those whose degrees are in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) fields, educators are speculating that the rule change will drive international students away from non-STEM majors."
Note that there are no mention of non-poor, well-educated people
I left the US, and now work for a company in a country which gives me 5 weeks vacation each year, with pay comparable to what I would have gotten in the Bay Area. And I don't have to worry about the visa crap or whether I will get a green card.
Je ne parle pas francais.
We need to start looking at reducing administration costs of the school systems and using the money on teachers and student needs. Look at most major cities, their cost per student can be double what outlying areas have and the majority of it can be traced to anything but teachers and students. What good is throwing money at public schools if the money isn't going to improve our children? Too many city schools are jobs programs for friends of the political powers. Dumping grounds for cronies. If that county school can graduate more students at a higher GPA and their students do better in higher education all the while costing the local taxpayers less how is the city's problem money related?
I would prefer more options for parents to send their children to schools of their choice. This means the dreaded "voucher". Make it so the money follows the child and not the school. This might be the only kick in the pants some school systems will understand. We have great teachers. We spend more than enough to educate the children we have, we just spend it wrong.
The easy solution is to "throw money at the problem" but that is used as an excuse to rid ourselves of the responsibility for making the hard choices. All we get with this thrown money is more cronies. I read my local "paper" to see schools with trailers and look at the changes that go on the system. What do I notice most after capital improvements? How many more people in non teaching positions crop up. Suddenly there are committees paid out of school funds to do work already done elsewhere or not needed. More money means more government employees, not necessarily teachers.
Sorry, no more money. Account for what they have. They owe to the children. We owe it the children.
Education here is not the reason we have H1 visas. We have those because politicians put more value on the money of corporations than the people who elect them. Do any of the three current candidates support scrapping this?
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
regardless of what you think of immigration, education, H1B's, and DHS, why are so many comments about immigration, employers, etc - and not governmental abuse of power?
if anyone would like to explain how using emergency powers in a non-emergency setting isn't abuse, please, step up to the plate.
the united states is a nation of laws; badly written and randomly enforced -- frank zappa
In New Zealand they have an elegant solution; the minimum salary for a foreign worker who is there on their equivalent of the H-1B program is $55,000. That ensures that companies are only likely to bring in foreign workers if there is a genuine shortage of people with their particular skills. Your salary is usually a pretty direct measure of how scarce people with your abilities/training are and how much demand there is, so anyone who is coming into the county to fill a shortage in a particular field should almost by definition be getting a relatively high salary.
Are foreign students suddenly less a "threat"? What changed?
It may have something to do with hundreds of millions per annum being lost because all those now 'suspect' chinese students that used to go to university in the states have started to go to Europe instead.
Its been great for England, my gosh yes, the extra revenue was seriously needed, but not so great for the US. Last I heard some US Universities were having serious problems trying to make up for the loss of that money.
Oddly enough European society has completely failed to collapse, and we haven't found ourselves dealing with hordes of evil Chinese people plotting to take over our countries.
Personally it helped me learn how to make some really good Chinese meals.
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
Certain skills still are in strong demand, says Ms. Chota, adding that the company can't find enough qualified graduates with degrees in computer science and those who have knowledge of both business and IT. "In the U.S., unfortunately, there are not enough great computer-science graduates," Ms. Chota says.""
Um excuse me? So, Americans are not good enough for IBM. Even though they go to the same great American universities just like the smarter foreigners.
So, which is it?!?
We brought accountability to the UK school system a while back. Children were tested (nationally) more often (age 7, 11 and 14, as well as the exams at 16). Schools were rated based on the children's results, and "bad" schools told to improve Or Else.
It hasn't worked (well, the government's agency sets the exams, and makes them slightly easier every year, so they say it's worked. But university professors get angry because they now have to teach science undergraduates maths that used to be taught in school).
Teachers were (of course) worried that the children wouldn't pass the exams, so they concentrated their efforts on teaching how to pass the maths exam, rather than teaching maths. Only maths, English and science are examined (at 7, 11 and 14) so less time was spent on all other subjects to make time for exam preparation.
This results in children enjoying school less -- partly because of the reduced curriculum, but mostly because of the increased pressure.
The ranking of schools isn't useful anyway -- schools in poor areas do worse, schools in rich areas do better, it's extremely difficult to do anything about that. The government's solution is to close two nearby bad schools, build a new "superschool", and then say "there were N bad schools, now there are only N/2!"
Wales decided they didn't like all the testing, so they got rid of the tests (the 7, 11 and I think the 14). The Welsh government person in charge of education says it's brilliant, which didn't go down well with her equivalent in London. Especially as they're both in the Labour party -- the London (i.e. setting policy for England) minister strongly supports the testing.
Overall, keeping politics out of education seems the best idea. Some independent schools are starting to offer the IB instead of A-levels.
Do you know how poorly teachers are paid? I do, I'm married to one. They make peanuts compared to what they could make in virtually any other field with the same level of education. So when the NEA talks about a funding problem, they're talking about teacher compensation. How can you attract the best talent when you don't pay competitive salaries?
The only structural problem with schools are the bloated administrations (which are not unionized.) But that doesn't even begin to explain why the schools are failing. The real problem is our culture. Parents treat the schools as (at best) a baby-sitting service. Too many of them simply don't care how well their children do academically. Failure and success begins with the parents.
Private schools generally pay their teachers *less*, so the teachers in them are no more talented. To the extent that private schools do better, it's because they cherry-pick the best students. You will fail if you simply try to privatize the schools on a large scale. That would just be shifting all the current problems into the private sector where it will be compounded by profit motives and shady accounting (seen the prison system lately?)
I get so sick of hearing that libertarian BS from people that don't even know the first thing about the real problem.
You will fail if you simply try to privatize the schools on a large scale.
The key is to restore competition to schooling at the elementary and high school level. We have world-class colleges, including the public ones, because colleges have to compete for customers.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
The CS program attendance plummeted at the same time salaries and job security in the field plummeted.
The talent is there, they don't want to work in a field where companies don't want to reward them.
They can't get americans to buy their crappy pay, benefits, and job security, so they want to farm out slave labor they can have deported at their whim.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
Because they can pick and choose their students.
If you don't have to bother with problematic students, of course you're going to get better results at a lower cost.
There's no mystery there.
Those four reasons lead to a less toxic environment in the classroom, which leads to better motivated teachers (even with the pay cut most private school teachers take), better motivated students, and: far better results.