Sample statement for labor certification for teaching faculty member

M E M O R A N D U M

TO:Atlanta Processing Center

U.S. Department of Labor/ETA

Attn: Certifying Officer

HarrisTower

233 Peachtree Street, Suite 410

Atlanta, Georgia 30303

Phone: (404) 893-0101

Fax: (404) 893-4642

FROM:Joe Smith, Professor (Department)

SUBJECT: John Brown (Prospective employee/applicant)

DATE: ______

This memorandum will describe the recruitment and selection procedures followed by the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the selection of Dr. John Brown to fill the position as an Assistant Professor. We believe that it will demonstrate that Dr. Brown was selected as the candidate best qualified to fill the position, that she was selected as the result of a competitive recruitment and selection process and that she is better qualified than any of the United States citizens or permanent residents who applied for the position.

In the spring of 1991, the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering recruited for several faculty positions in three different areas of specialization. One of those areas was telecommunications, and we were authorized to hire one senior and two junior faculty members in that area. We advertised these positions in the February 1992 edition of the IEEE Spectrum, the professional journal of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering. We also sent position announcements to 34 electrical engineering departments throughout the country to solicit applications from the institutions most likely to produce qualified candidates. Copies of the advertisement and the cover of the IEEE Spectrum, of the job announcement, and a list of the places it was sent are attached. In addition, several of our faculty members contacted colleagues by telephone or in person to solicit applications (see list attached). We believe that the advertisement in the IEEE Spectrum reached virtually all of the qualified engineers who would be interested in applying for one of our positions, since this is the standard journal for recruiting in our area of specialization. We further believe that the mailed job announcement and the personal contacts by our faculty members directed even more attention to our recruiting efforts so that any qualified United States citizens or permanent residents ho might be interested in our positions were informed of their availability.

As a result of this advertising and recruitment effort, 17 engineers applied for the junior faculty position for which Dr. Brown was ultimately hired. A search committee chaired by Professor Joe Smith examined all of the applications and eliminated 13 of the applicants as being less qualified than the leading four. The four finalists, including Dr. Brown, were invited to campus for interviews and to give seminars. The seminars were attended by other faculty members in the department and in related departments, by graduate students, and by all members of the search committee.

The search committee discussed the applicants among themselves and with other faculty members. After evaluating the teaching skills, research experience and promise and the specialized area of interest of each of the candidates, the search committee selected Dr. Joan Brown as the most highly qualified applicant. The three other finalists, like the 13 applicants eliminated earlier, demonstrated less highly developed teaching skills, not as high a quality research and research interests less compatible with the specific need of the department than did Dr.Brown.

Dr. Brown was educated and received her Doctor of Technical Sciences degree (equivalent to the United States PhD degree) from the Eidgenosse Technische Hochschule, or Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, commonly called ETH. ETH is a distinguished European university known throughout the world for its high quality. At the ETH, Dr. Brown did her dissertation of Professor Joachim Schmidt, a scientist of world renown who is known for the high standards he holds for his students. While completing her Doctor of Technical Sciences degree, Dr. Brown worked as a Research Associate at the University of Illinois for 18 months in 1990-91. The combination of the high quality of her training at the ETH, her extensive research experience, her particular area of research interest, her teaching ability as demonstrated by the seminar she conducted here, and the enthusiastic recommendations we received about her made her clearly the most qualified applicant for the position. The search committee and the department readily agreed on her selection and the Dean concurred on January 23, 1991.

We made an offer to Dr. Brown, and she accepted. She was appointed as Assistant Professor with a starting salary of $45,000.00 for the academic year 2003-2004.

We have no doubts that we made the right decision in selecting Dr.Brown as the most highly qualified for the position.

Xxx

John Doe, Chair

NOTE! This is a sample, not necessarily a pattern you must follow. Note that it contains the following elements:

(1)A statement signed by the department chair “outlining in detail the complete recruitment

procedure”;

(2)“The total number of applicants for the job opportunity”;

(3)The specific lawful job-related reasons why the alien is more qualified than each USworker who applied for the job” and

(4)“A written statement attesting to the degree of the alien’s educational or professional qualifications and academic achievements.’

(5)The date the alien was selected for the position.