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News : Tri-Valley State University raid by ICE – Scam impacts 1,555 Intl students

There has been quite a bit of news coverage in the past one week about the scam related to Tri-Valley University, which is based out of Pleasanton in San Francisco Bay Area,  since ICE conducted a raid on its premises and at Ruby Hill on Jan 19th, 2011. Let me summarize in few sentences and give you necessary links from News sources to read more details, along with recommended options.

Summary of the Tri-Valley State University(TVSU) Raid/Scam :

Federal agents raided TriValley State University in relation to an immigration related fraud conducted by them. The Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) is investigating the issue related to claim that TVSU is helping foreign nationals illegally acquire immigration status, especially stating that they are in local area for studies, but illegally working in other states, etc…This was filed as a federal complaint in a California Court. The school is currently shut down and investigation is in progress.

Impact on International Students by Tri-Valley Students Fraud :

As per various news sources, about 1,555 international students are impacted by the raid. Unfortunately, of these 95 percent of these students are from India and many of these are from Andhra Pradesh. The students are being interrogated…Based on the news footage by telugu news channel, they say that current students were held in custody, interrogated and were attached devices to track their movement(seems very extreme, not sure if this is true)….The fraud will impact the international students current immigration status…they may have to leave country if needed…

Options Provided by ICE to International students impacted by cases like Tri-Valley University :

As ICE does these kind of  raids, they have provided a general set of guidelines to International students in various scenarios like planning to start, currently enrolled, etc. You should read the following document for ful information :

The general options listed in document are:
1. Depart United States
2. Transfer to other SEVP certified school. Check list of SEVP-Certified Schools

Read above listed document if you need full info.

Seeking Help :


There have been an initiative by one of the non-profit Indo-American organization TANA to help students. You may read their press release to help Tri-valley Impacted Students, which has some info on attorney’s help and potential reduced attorney fee to help students.
Also, ICE states in their document on their website that you can contact them at at  SEVIS.Source@dhs.gov for help.

Recommendation to prospective International students  :


As I checked the Tri-Valley University website… just after a quick glance at the website, I can sense some snake oil…There is a funny article written on Yahoo News indicating all the Typos, asking where is Grammar Police ? . Often the options and offers given by these fraud schools can be very lucrative to maintain your status in US or to enter America…you have to do your due diligence before you take any decision by checking info like accreditation, how long the school has been in operation, what is the enrollment like, what is the student body like, are they compliant, etc.  Do NOT just pick a school because it is giving you easy admission or CPT from first semester…thats a big mistake….Just ask one basic question, why is a reputed or state run school not giving this same flexibility as the school like Tri-valley state ?   Anyways, just be careful and do your due diligence…

News articles published in last week related to TVSU Fraud:

You may read more info with details by reading below listed articles :

What are your thoughts on the Tri-Valley University Fraud ?

   

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6 Comments

  1. It’s ironic that this article calls out the bad grammar on the websites of fraudulent organizations. It’s a valid thing to look out for but grammar on this website is so bad that you should take your own advice. I thought most people in India learn English but their English is consistently bad.

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  2. Why would anyone even consider joining these kind of universities? Just a look at their website is enough to know that they are not providing full information. Compare it with the websites of well known schools. They are not in the ranking system, they offer all kinds of academic programs, but do not belong to any tier system? Though the students will play innocent for legal support, I am pretty sure that any student smart enough to get into a college wont be dumb enough to not realize the game going on.

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  3. Hi kumar,

    Last year i was about to join in this university.. luckily i checked the reviews of this university . they seem to be very bad and some said its a fraud … so i dropped my option… this is a good article and it will aware the people abt this fraud university…

    thx
    vijaya

    Reply

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