Immigration Site

Hello all,
This is a great forum for a lot of people.
I have self-petitioned for EB1a at NSC on June 28th 2010 and got an RFE dated July 20th. It was a surprise as my online status still says initial review.
My credentials:
Post-doc working on Diabetes/ Obesity at a very well respected lab
5 Publications, one as a co-author in #1 journal published recently
45 citations overall
One book published as a sole author, available online all around the world
Several news articles about my work,
Reviewer for two journals

I have claimed four different criteria in my petition
1. Original scholarly contributions, 2. Publications 3. Judge of others work 4. News/ media coverage.
Request For Evidence questions
1. The record contains several letters from your colleagues and mentors, as well as independent experts. While these letters praise your work, they do not constitute verifiable documentary evidence of contributions to the field. Please submit objective documentary evidence of the significance of your contributions to the field.
(I do not understand this question. The letters clearly point to my contributions by referring to my publications and other presentations. Is this a very general kind of query? I am planning to submit a list of my contributions and get more letters for this question and highlight my contributions in them. Is this enough? )
After this statement the next paragraph states the following.

2. The record contains evidence that you have authored peer reviewed articles and made several presentations at scientific conferences. The record also includes evidence that your work has been cited by other researchers on 45 occasions.

(That’s where the sentence ends. What does this mean? Are they satisfied by the evidence?)


3. Please submit any news/ trade journal articles relating to your work in the field.
(This query clearly tells me that the officer did not look at the application carefully at all. I have submitted around 10 news articles and three of them talk about my work clearly and mention my name at least 3 times each. How do I respond to this? Should I repeat what I said earlier and respectfully ask the officer to look at it again?)

4. Submit more evidence of being a judge of others work and clearly state the criteria.

(I will submit more evidence as a journal reviewer. I have also reviewed many articles for my boss. Should I mentions this and get another letter from him stating the same? Is it worth it?)

Last question:
When I respond to the query, should I include all the documentary evidence again with the letter or is it OK if I refer to my previous submission?

Thank you all a lot.

Waiting for some words of wisdom

Also, looking at the RFE what do you think my chances are?

Hi

The first guess I can make from this REf (especially from question number 2), is that the IO never recived your publications. Did you send copies with the application?

Hi,

Im unclear about what they mean by "verifiable documentary evidence of contributions to the field" beyond your publications. As niwseek asks: were your publications submitted with your application? If you did, then the problem lies in your reference letters. Did your references talk about specific things in your work that have helped them or others materially in their research? Every letter praises the applicant, but they may have wanted to see more than praise-- i.e., actual material contributions to the scientific community. My letters clearly stated how aspects of my work have been used by the "bigshots", and that their research benefited greatly from it.

And about more evidence being a judge of others work: I would suggest asking the editor-in-chief (or a ranking editor) of the journal(s) you reviewed for for a short letter, saying your assistance in reviewing articles has been invaluable, and that your reviews were excellent. (I had one letter like this in my application. Even though the editor-in-chief didnt know me personally, he wrote a nice short letter for me after I explained what it was for. They know all about GC applications, so theyre mostly very helpful.)

Good luck!

Not a lawyer, etc. etc..

To niwseek

I did submit full copies of my publications as well as citations that highlight my work.

To tampaboy
I guess you are spot on. While I got recos from bigshots in the field who praised my work overall they did not emphasize on any particular aspect of the work except one letter from a CEO of a company, who said that my work helped them in going for clinical trials with their compound.

I have two questions regarding this.

Is it ok if I ask the same people to give me a modified letter? I also plan to get more letters from other people.

Do you think 2-3 letters emphasizing my work are enough?

Also,
what do you both think of my questions 2 and 3?

Thanks a lot.