Serving as a TA while on a H1-B visa (not permitted)

While one can be sympathetic both to H-1B postdocs who wish to gain teaching experience and to faculty who may be in desperate need for additional TAs, there are several reasons why these requests cannot be accommodated.

• Since H1B visas are approved for research, additional teaching duties require the HIO to file an amended H-1B with an updated, higher wage.
• The filing takes time (3-4 months). The HIO doesn’t anticipate any improvement in processing times any time soon. Expedited filing is possible, but it is expensive and is not covered by any budget.
• The postdoc may not teach until the amended filing is approved, which obviously is a real problem, as soon as the semester begins
• Once the teaching is complete, the HIO must then file another amendment to remove teaching duties and reset the wage to the researcher number.

Given these issues, requests for postdocs on H-1B visas to serve as TAs will not be approved. Please note that the issue doesn’t apply to postdocs on J1 visas.