Ore. teacher faces deportation; says district didn't help with visa
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BEAVERTON, Ore. - A teacher in the Beaverton School District says he'll be deported because the district didn't help him stay.
Mario Vilela's work visa expired just four days ago, and he says the district knew it was coming for two years.
Vilela says Beaverton Schools wanted him to keep teaching but just didn't do anything to help renew his work visa. He could find out in days, or weeks, whether he'll have to go back to Peru.
"Teaching is my passion. It's my life," Vilela says. "I feel my dream is over. It's done. I don't have any dreams now."
Instead, he's fighting to stay in America.
He moved here from Peru in 2006, studied at Portland State University and then worked at Estacada Web Academy. It still says so on his visa, which is the problem.
For the past two years he's actually taught Spanish at Whitford Middle School in Beaverton.
"I was trusting them," he says about the district. "All this time, I trusted them."
Vilela says he thought the district was updating his visa. He says he asked the district about it in 2010. This June he found out that the district hadn't done anything.
In an email, a district spokeswoman wrote KATU: "The District cannot legally employ a non-citizen who does not hold a valid visa." The email also says it was Vilela's duty to apply for an updated work visa, not the district's responsibility.
"The day of my termination was probably the most horrible day of my life," Vilela says. "I was doing my bus duty. The principal came and said this is your last day."
Vilela did send an email to Beaverton schools two years ago about his visa, but it turns out he emailed an employee who wasn't working there anymore. So nobody ever got the message.
On Monday, Vilela and his lawyer will argue their case to the school board executive committee.
Mario Vilela's should have consult a immigration lawyer now what he can do that go back to his country(Peru) and provide his services to his own country.
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Look at the rabid christians and tea party comments below. Â Anything to do with public schools who teach evolution brings out the nut cases. Â
@ Andrew Bush, Where did you come up with that?  You really are that hateful and bigoted aren't you.
News?!... Right...
This isn't news - how did this story get published?
If teaching is your passion - take it back to Peru with you and make a change.
His responsibility, his mistake. Â If they deport him he gets a free ticket out of it. Â He better start shipping his stuff home.
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Besides there are plenty of unemployed American school teachers that can take his place.
In two years he never checked back with the district to confirm the work had been done?Â
 @Table9 yeah, rather suspicious. Imagine trusting a school bureaucracy with something as critical as your work visa.
Good ,now he can go back to Peru. Teach there and improve and enlighten those students. or is it he can't make as much money there ?
A nd this is the school,s responsability how?? Thats right we the people have no responsability for ourselves any more... This man (in age only) has know for two years that it was not done when he first got hired and did nothing since to make it happen. Now call the waaaanblence for him as they send his lazzy butt home. I have needed to get work permits to work across the boarded before, lots of hops to jump through and if you do not keep on top of the process the application WILL get lost. I the person who wants the work permit must keep after the company and the agancy handleing the permits to make sure it goes through not lay down and whine when some one who has no care if it goes through or not drope it in to the round file.
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At least he didn't sneak across the boarder to get here. You would think being he is here on a visa he would have started the process if he wanted to stay.
Well if you really wanna stay, then take the time to become a legal American citizen. That's all you gotta do! Â That's all I gotta say!
 @Zoso Tell that to all the H1Bs at various American businesses.
Why should the school district "help him stay"? Wouldn't this be his responsibility to get his visa renewed and not the school districts?
 @Coyote It is the responsibility of the EMPLOYER to certify to Immigration that the H1B visa holder is serving a critical need so that the visa can be granted, renewed, extended or transferred. No, he COULD NOT get his visa renewed by himself!
 @JLS1950 You are making the assumption that he is here on an H1-B visa. More likely he was here on an L-1 Visa or even a student visa.
 @Rider I think we can dismiss the L-1 visa idea out of hand: "L-1 visas are available to employees of an international company with offices in both the United States and abroad."
I very much doubt that the Beaverton School District has branch offices in Peru where Mr. Vilela was employed for at least a year before coming to the United States. Same also for Estacada Web Academy. It is likely that Vilela studied at Portland State University under a student visa, but then converted that to an H-1B as he joined Estacada.
The H-1B is designed for persons who have attained a bachelors degree in and are specially proficient in a particular field - teaching Latin American Spanish language, for example, or writing web copy intended for Latin American audiences.The H-1B must be requested by the EMPLOYER - not by the foreign worker: "H-1B work-authorization is strictly limited to employment by the sponsoring employer."
"If a foreign worker in H-1B status quits or is dismissed from the sponsoring employer, the worker must either apply for and be granted a change of status to another non-immigrant status, find another employer (subject to application for adjustment of status and/or change of visa), or leave the US." -- which looks like exactly what happened here: Vilela ended his employment at Estacada under unknown circumstances, and formed an agreement with Beaverton SD to create a new sponsorship under the H-1B program. Beaverton SD then appears to have failed in its responsibilities under this agreement.
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@Coyote You would certinly expect so. Why should the school district do what this man should do for himself?
 @uplink  Because ONLY the employer can get an H1B visa extended or transferred... THAT'S why!
@JLS1950 No infact he is not illegal to me. He came here the right way. What I have a bit of a problem with is he made the assumption that they were doing it and didn't check to see how the process was going. You would think he would be more interested in what was going on.
 @uplink The H-1B process is quite complex, and it is easy for one not familiar with U.S. law to get confused. Hopefully another employer will step forward and an immigration lawyer will help untangle the red tape with Immigration. Sounds like there was some sort of contract in place and, email or not, the other party dropped the ball.
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Of course, it you are simply looking for some excuse to smack-down the "illegal", then you won't see it that way.
@JLS1950 Maybe he should have done more than send ONE e-mail to a employee that no longer worked for the School district??
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NEVER trust academics to do any kind of administrative work correctly, in an organized manner, Â or on time.Â
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