| DV2006 |
| FAQ |
What is the Diversity Visa Lottery Program?
Your spouse and unmarried children under the age of 21 (at the time the green card - not the lottery application - is approved) are automatically entitled to the same status as you.Ê Under the new Child Status Protection Act, children of lottery-based green card applicants, the age of the child minus the adjudication time of the lottery-based immigrant petition at the time a visa number becomes available for the parent is the age used for determining whether the child is eligible for the green card as an under 21 year old child.Ê But to take advantage of this, the child actually must seek to acquire the green card within a year of the visa becoming available.Ê Also, in the case of a child who turns 21 while a lottery-based green card application is pending who is not eligible to claim to be under 21 for purposes of seeking a green card, may still retain the original date issued upon receipt of the original petition and it is not necessary to file a new application because the case will automatically convert to the appropriate category.
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Who is Eligible to Enter the Diversity Visa Lottery?
* You or your spouse must be a native of a country that is eligible to participate in the Diversity Visa Lottery. You may also be eligible to apply if your parent was born in a country that is eligible to participate. (The State Department will publish the names of countries that are eligible to participate before each year's lottery.)
* You must have a high school diploma or the equivalent, defined in the United States as successful completion of a 12-year course of elementary and secondary education; OR you must have two years of work experience within the last five years in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience to perform.
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How Can I Find Out If I Won?
Only the winners will be notified by mail at the addresses listed on their applications. Winners will be sent instructions and information on fees. Being selected as a winner in the diversity visa lottery does not automatically guarantee that you will be issued a visa, even if you are qualified. The number of entries selected is greater than the number of immigrant visas available, because not everyone selected will be qualified for the visa or will choose to complete the processing. Once all 50,000 visas have been issued, the diversity visa program for the year will end.
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If I win, can I get green cards for my family?
Your spouse and unmarried children under the age of 21 (at the time the green card - not the lottery application - is approved) are automatically entitled to the same status as you.Ê Under the new Child Status Protection Act, children of lottery-based green card applicants, the age of the child minus the adjudication time of the lottery-based immigrant petition at the time a visa number becomes available for the parent is the age used for determining whether the child is eligible for the green card as an under 21 year old child.Ê But to take advantage of this, the child actually must seek to acquire the green card within a year of the visa becoming available.Ê Also, in the case of a child who turns 21 while a lottery-based green card application is pending who is not eligible to claim to be under 21 for purposes of seeking a green card, may still retain the original date issued upon receipt of the original petition and it is not necessary to file a new application because the case will automatically convert to the appropriate category.
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Why was my country excluded?
The DV lottery is designed to increase the diversity of the overall pool of immigrants coming to the US. Countries that are proportionately over-represented in the immigrant population are excluded. Countries that have sent more than 50,000 immigrants to the US in the past five years are put on to the list above.
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How are visas allotted?
The DV program apportions visa issuance among six geographic regions
(Africa, Asia, Europe, North America (other than Mexico), Oceania, and South
America (including Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean). The world is
divided up into high and low admission regions and each of the six regions is
divided into high and low admission states. A greater portion of the visas go
to the low admission regions than to high admissions regions. High admission
states are entirely excluded from the lottery (those states are listed above)
and low admission states compete equally with other low admission states in
the same region. No single state may receive more than 7% (3,500) of the
50,000 allotted visas.
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Who is eligible to apply for the lottery?
To receive a DV visa, an individual must be a native of a low admission
foreign state (described above). The individual must have at least a high school education or its equivalent, or, within the preceding five years, two years work experience in an occupation requiring at least two years training or
experience.
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What does it mean to have a "high school education or its equivalent?"
"High School education or its equivalent" means the successful completion of a
twelve year course of elementary and secondary education in the U.S. or
successful completion in another county of a formal course of elementary and
secondary education comparable to complete a 12 year education in the U.S.
or successful completion in another country of a formal cause of elementary
and secondary education comparable to completion of a 12 year education in
the U.S. Passage of a high school equivalency examination is not sufficient. It
is permissible to have completed one's education in less than 12 years or more
than 12 years if the course of study completed is equivalent to a U.S. high
school education. Documentary proof of education (including a diploma or
school transcript) should NOT be submitted with the application, but must be
presented to the consular office at the time of formally applying for an immigrant visa application.
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What does it mean to have "two years work experience in an occupation
requiring at least two years training or experience?"
The determination of which occupations require at least two years of training or experience shall be based upon the Department of Labor's O*Net Online database. Previously, when work experience was used as the equivalent of high school graduation, the employment position was compared to those in the US Department of Labor Dictionary of Occupational Titles.Ê The Labor Department has phased out this publication and replaced it with the O*Net online system. To reflect this change, the State Department will begin using O*Net classifications in determining whether an applicant has the equivalent of a high school education. The O*Net system is available online at http://online.onetcenter.org. As with proof of education, documentary proof of work experience should not be submitted with the application, but must be presented to the consular office at the time of a formal immigrant visa application.
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Can I be a "native" of a country other than the country in which I was born?
A native is both someone born within one of qualifying countries and someone
entitled to the "charged" to such country under Section 202(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Thus someone may be (1) charged to the country of birth of his/her spouse, but only if the spouse is also issued a visa and enters the US at the same time as the primary applicant; (2) a minor dependent child can be charged to the country of birth of a parent; and (3) an applicant born in a country of which neither parent was a native may be charged to the country of birth of either parent.
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Will applying for the lottery affect one's ability to receive a nonimmigrant visa?
Probably not. Technically, filing a visa lottery application is equivalent to filing
an immigrant petition. According to a source at the Department of State, a
consulate will only be notified IF the person is selected in the lottery. An
individual who is not chosen is on his honor to state that he/she applied for the lottery. Theoretically, if your name is selected in the lottery, you may have trouble renewing nonimmigrant status while waiting for your name to be cleared for processing (see discussion on the post-selection process for securing a green card). This should only be a temporary problem since permanent residency should eventually be awarded. There is still a risk that you will fail to be deemed eligible for the DV visa or the Department of State will have overestimated the number of individuals to select in the lottery (see discussion on how the selection process works). However, of all the lawyers with whom I have spoken, none have ever reported a problem with a client having entered the lottery. We have instructed our clients to answer the question on the DS-156 concerning previous immigrant visa applications as follows: "My lawyer entered me in the DV-2005 lottery." We have never had a problem reported and I have yet to hear of anyone denied a visa because of a previous lottery application.
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Are there any limitations on the number of entries I can send in for the lottery?
Each individual is limited to one application in the lottery. If more than one
application is received, the individual will be totally disqualified. Note: HundredsÊof thousands of applications are rejected every year due to multiple applications. It is not a problem if you have submitted an application during a PREVIOUS lottery registration.
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About Apply
May a husband and wife each submit a separate application?
Yes. If otherwise qualified, a husband and a wife may each submit one lottery
application. If either is selected in the lottery, the other would be entitled to
derivative status.
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If I win, can I get green cards for my family?
Your spouse and unmarried children under the age of 21 (at the time the green card - not the lottery application - is approved) are automatically entitled to the same status as you.Ê Under the new Child Status Protection Act, children of lottery-based green card applicants, the age of the child minus the adjudication time of the lottery-based immigrant petition at the time a visa number becomes available for the parent is the age used for determining whether the child is eligible for the green card as an under 21 year old child.Ê But to take advantage of this, the child actually must seek to acquire the green card within a year of the visa becoming available.Ê Also, in the case of a child who turns 21 while a lottery-based green card application is pending who is not eligible to claim to be under 21 for purposes of seeking a green card, may still retain the original date issued upon receipt of the original petition and it is not necessary to file a new application because the case will automatically convert to the appropriate category.
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Is there a minimum age to apply for the lottery?
There is not a minimum age to apply for the lottery. However, the education/work experience requirements will effectively preclude most people
under 18 from applying.
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How does the selection process work?
The State Department's Kentucky Consular Center will receive all applications submitted electronically. Upon receipt, the KCC will the application into one of six geographic regions and assign the applicant an individual number. Within each region, the first applicant randomly selected will be the first person registered, the second applicant selected will be the second person registered, etc. When a case is registered, the applicant will immediately be sent a notification letter that will give visa application instructions. About 90,000 persons, both principal applicants and their spouses and children, will be registered. Since it is probable that some of the first 50,000 persons registered will not apply for a DV visa, this figure is assumed to be large enough to ensure that all of the visas are used. However, there is a risk that some applicants will be left out. Indeed, this has been a problem for people drawn
late in the selection process. According to the Department of State, all applicants will be informed promptly of their place on the list. Each month visas will be issued, according to registration lottery rank order, to those ready for visa issuance for that month. Once 50,000 visas are issued, the program ends.
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How will I know if I was selected or not selected?
The State Department will notify winners by mail between May 2005 and July 2005. The State Department will not notify applicants to let them know they were not selected. The only way you will know that you are not selected is if you have not received a registration notification letter before the date the INS officially states that it has stopped notifying people.
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Do I need to send photographs of each family member?
Recent photographs of the applicant and his/her spouse and each child, including all natural children as well as all legally-adopted and stepchildren, excepting a child who is already a U.S. citizen or a Legal Permanent Resident, even if a child no longer resides with the applicant, must be attached electronically to the entry. Group or family photos will not be accepted; there must be a separate photo for each family member.
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If the submitted digital images do not conform to the following specifications, the system will automatically reject the Entry Form and notify the sender.
The image must be in the Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) format.
* The image must be either in color or grayscale; monochrome images (2-bit color depth) will not be accepted.
* If a new digital photograph is taken, it must have a resolution of 320 pixels wide by 240 pixels high, and a color depth of either 24-bit color, 8-bit color, or 8-bit grayscale.
* If a photographic print is scanned, the print must be 2 inches by 2 inches (50mm x 50mm) square. It must be scanned at a resolution of 150 dots per inch (dpi) and with a color depth of either 24-bit color, 8-bit color, or 8-bit grayscale.
* The maximum image size accepted will be sixty-two thousand five hundred (62,500) bytes.
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If the submitted digital images do not conform to the following specifications, the entry will be disqualified:
Applicant, spouse, or child must be directly facing the camera; the head of the person being photographed should not be tilted up, down or to the side, and should cover about 50% of the area of the photo.
* The photo should be taken with the person being photographed in front of a neutral, light-colored background. Photos taken with very dark or patterned, busy backgrounds will not be accepted.
* Photos in which the face of the person being photographed is not in focus will not be accepted.
* Photos in which the person being photographed is wearing sunglasses or other paraphernalia which detracts from the face will not be accepted.
* Photos of applicants wearing head coverings or hats are only acceptable due to religious beliefs, and even then, may not obscure any portion of the face of the applicant. Photos of applicants with tribal or other headgear not specifically religious in nature are not acceptable. Photos of military, airline or other personnel wearing hats will not be accepted.
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