20h work limit

[Charlie Moon]

Hey,

 

I will most likely be offered a place but on a low stipend. I would be more than happy to work a couple hours more here and there to make up for it but I have heard there is a hour maximum and you cannot work off campus. Do you guys know of anyway to go around this ? Would working online in my home country be a problem ? Can I tutor for cash or is it a big risk for maintaining my visa ?

 

Thanks in advance !

[TakeruK]

If you do any work that was not authorized then you do risk maintaining your visa and legal status. 

Working online in your home country has always been a grey zone. If you don't want to risk it, talk to your school's international student office to see what they say. At my PhD school, they basically say it's a grey zone and they can't offer legal advice. They just tell us what the rules are (which doesn't directly cover cases like this). But hearing it from some experts might help you make the right decision for you. You could also consider consulting an immigration attorney in the US to ensure you are not at risk of losing your visa/status.

Tutoring for cash is definitely against the rules. Without a paper record, it will not be easy for the authorities to know but I personally would not risk it. You never know if some client is unhappy with you and decides to screw you over. 

If the stipend is enough to live on, for me, getting kicked out of school/country and not finishing my PhD is not worth the extra money. If the stipend isn't enough to live on, I would rather just not go to the PhD program at all than to have to work under the table and have all of that stress in addition to risk getting kicked out.

[Charlie Moon]

Thanks ! My stipend should be enough to live on if I'm careful, but not to have any money on the side for emergencies. Last question : could I theoretically get a summer job in my home country ? that would make me add around 3000$ to 4000$ to my yearly income which would be awesome 

[TakeruK]

14 hours ago, Charlie Moon said:

Thanks ! My stipend should be enough to live on if I'm careful, but not to have any money on the side for emergencies. Last question : could I theoretically get a summer job in my home country ? that would make me add around 3000$ to 4000$ to my yearly income which would be awesome 

The short answer is yes, most likely.

The longer answer is that as international students in the USA, when it comes to working for income outside of our degree program, there are two sets of requirements we have to meet. First, we have to ensure we follow the rules set by USCIS to properly maintain lawful F-1 or J-1 status. This one is easy---when you are at home in your home country, you are not on F-1 or J-1 status so there are no restrictions on you from the USA. Second, you have to meet the commitment requirements of your PhD program. If your program lets you leave during the summer to do whatever you want, then going home during the summer to work would probably be okay. Maybe this depends on the field, but in many STEM fields, PhD programs are 12 months a year (and you get paid for 12 months a year) so you can't really take time off to do something like this.

In addition, if your program doesn't have any summer requirements and you're not committed to the school in the summer (i.e. no TA or RA responsibilities), then you have another option besides going home to work in the summer. If you are on F-1 status, you can take Optional Practical Training (OPT) time if you find a summer job in the USA related to your field of study. If you are on J-1 status, you can take Academic Training (AT) time in the summers. There is a limit of how many months you can be on this status, which depends on your field of study. But this is something you should discuss with your international student office.