Job search in the US for International Graduate Students & Postdocs
I was invited as a panelist of the career fair session “U.S Jobs for International Graduate Students & Postdocs” at UChicago. Here’s a recap of the questions I answered.
I was invited to participate as a panelist in one of the panel sessions in GradUCon* 2020 of the University of Chicago — “U.S Jobs for International Graduate Students & Postdocs”. I am writing to recap (and enrich) my answers to several questions raised during the session — some of them are specific to my personal experience.
*GradUCon is an annual event at UChicago in which graduate students/postdocs explore career options and establish connections with alumni in the fields.
1. Tell me about yourself — where are you from, what did you study here, and what profession are you in right now?
I grew up and did my bachelor’s degree in Hong Kong before entering the Ph.D. program here. I graduated from the Ph.D. program in the Department of Geophysical Sciences in 2017 Fall, specializing in atmospheric dynamics. I decided to work in the industry in my last year in grad school but realize that most meteorologist positions require security clearance(i.e. US citizenship required), which an international cannot fulfill. I then started to think about switching to data sciences.
Right now, I am a senior data scientist in the division of Decision Sciences at Conversant Media, a digital marketing company. I specialize in the personalization of creative content.
2. How has your experience at UChicago prepared you for employment in the US?
After making the decision to explore career opportunities in the industry, I consulted advice from career advisors at UChicagoGRAD — they connected me to alumni working in the industry. That’s how I got my internship after graduation at Tempus, from which I acquired plenty of knowledge in natural language processing(NLP) that helped me land on my current position. In my opinion, the most valuable thing that UChicago prepared me with is the network of alumni.
3. When did you disclose your international student status in the job application process? Would I be screened out revealing my status?
In the job application form, you should answer “yes” to the question “do you need visa sponsorship in the future”, indicating your need for H-1B visa sponsorship. It is true that some companies would screen you out because of this, but you’d better answer this honestly for the sake of integrity.
Note that if you are eligible for STEM OPT(an extra 24 months after the first year of OPT), an employer can hire you without sponsoring a visa when your OPT is valid. You can state this in your application as an additional remark for them to consider.
I strongly encourage you to talk to employees in the company before applying to find out whether the company welcomes visa holders — it is also much better to have an employee referred you instead of “cold applying”. This saves you a lot of energy applying to companies that do not welcome internationals.
4. How did you discuss work authorization and sponsorship of an employment visa with an employer?
I work in a large company that has plenty of international employees, so I didn’t have to negotiate for sponsorship at all.
You can work for any employers(which fulfill the degree relevancy requirement) for with/without salary in your first year of OPT(i.e. voluntary work also counts). However, to be eligible for STEM OPT extension, you have to be employed by an E-verify employer with salary.
5. How did you negotiate for your salary?
This question was directed to be answered by another panelist — she suggested that you shall let the company name the salary instead of offering your quote if possible. I provided an extra piece of information: the job titles and salaries of H-1B visa holders are available on the website of the United States Department of Labor (DOL). One can gauge the range of reasonable salary with the data as a reference.
6. Clare, can you tell me more about how to get into the Insight Health Data Fellowship you participated in? Is it competitive? How should I prepare for it?
This question is not specific to the context of international students, but I want to remind you all that the Insight Fellowship program does not count as employment to maintain your OPT status.
I was in the 2017 summer cohort in Boston. During my time, the admission rate was 6% so I’d say it was pretty competitive, but I don’t think the technical requirement is high to get in. In the interview, I was asked to present a project you’ve done before with data science/machine learning.
I’d say being likable is a more important criterion once you get a chance to interview — eventually, Insight is introducing you to their partnering companies as a candidate for their data science teams and they want their recommendations to have a good vibe. (At Ph.D. levels, being able to get technical is a prerequisite.)
One thing I forgot to mention was that you would have a much higher chance to get an interview for the Insight program if you are referred by alumni. So, reach out to people.
7. What would you have done if you can travel back in time, like, if back to the times in grad school?
I think I should have kept an open mind that academia is not the only choice of career and explored various career options earlier — having done an internship would increase your chance of getting job interviews drastically. The internship at Tempus helps me a lot in landing on my current job.
