The Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS) is an Internet-based software application developed by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and its purpose is to facilitate timely reporting and monitoring of foreign students (F and M visas) and exchange visitors (J visa) and their dependents in the United States. SEVIS also allows printing of the appropriate forms and provides reminders, alerts, and basic reporting capabilities. SEVIS' scope includes the range of activities associated with the capture of data surrounding the student/exchange visitor pre-arrival activities, arrival, status while in the U.S., and program completion. While the SEVIS Real-Time Interactive portion of SEVIS was available July 1, 2002, the Patriot Act of October 2001 requires that ALL institutions fully implement SEVIS by January 30, 2003.
SEVIS requires that no later than 30 days following the deadline for registering for classes, the school is required to report that the student failed to register. Furthermore, during each term or session and no later than 30 days after the deadline for registering for classes, schools are required to report the following registration information:
· Whether the student has enrolled at the school, dropped below a full course of study without prior authorization by the Designated School Official (DSO), or failed to enroll;
· The current address of each enrolled student; and
· The start date of the student's next session, term, semester, trimester, or quarter.
Also, within 21 days of a change of any information, schools will be required to report the following information:
· Any student who has failed to maintain status or complete his or her program;
· A change of the student's or dependent's legal name or U.S. address;
· Any student who has graduated early or prior to the program end date;
· Any disciplinary action taken by the school against the student as a result of the student being convicted of a crime; and
· Any other notification request made by SEVIS with respect to the current status of the student.
The SEVIS tables in J1 Desktop exist to store current data for students and to store history data. Data are moved from current tables to the history tables when you successfully "report" on changes to the INS.
To this end, J1 Desktop provides two windows (SEVIS Employers and Sites and International Students and Exchange Visitors) that include most of the data elements needed for reporting to the INS. The International Students and Exchange Visitors window allows you to initiate a process that populates the current SEVIS tables with data from existing columns, such as Birth Date, Major, Address, etc.
Additional information about SEVIS notices, regulations, and rules can be found on the following website: