< back
UNIVERSITIES SUFFER EFFECTS FROM H-1B VISA CAP
Lost in the general debate over H-1B visas, which are typically portrayed as going exclusively to high-tech workers, is the fact that American colleges and universities use these visas to employ foreign professors and researchers.  While the impact of the cap on technology-based businesses is widely discussed, its impact on institutions of higher learning is seldom given notice.  While it may not be as well known, the impact of the H-1B cap is just as, if not more, devastating for schools. 
Colleges and universities are faced with many disadvantages in the competitive race for H-1B visas.  One of the largest is the fact that schools have a much different hiring process than businesses.  There are many more levels of bureaucracy and less centralized decision making in the academic arena.  This problem is made worse by the time of year in which schools do most of their hiring.  Because the academic year begins in the early fall, the selection process generally begins in the spring.  As we saw this year, the cap can be reached before a school is ready to offer a position.  Add to this the fact that once the cap is reached, new visas aren’t available until October 1, about a month into school, and hiring foreign scholars becomes a challenge for US schools. 
One could say that this is just part of the competition of the marketplace and that it is right that the visas go to the first to apply, but colleges and universities are not traditionally governed by the market in employment situations.  Even more so than a business, schools want and need to attract the best minds in a field.  Indeed, it is the reputation of US schools as having some of the best faculty that has made American higher education among the most respected in the world. 
Advocates for colleges are universities are strongly supporting the Senate H-1B bill, which would exempt professors and researchers from the cap.  The House bill, which would only set aside visas for use by academics, is not as favored because it maintains a cap. The Senate bill would actually carve out an exemption from the cap for institutions of higher learning.