Holiday Travel for J-1 Participants

Woohoo! Looking forward to Thanksgiving dinner... turkey, stuffing and mashed potatoes?Before you lose yourself in the holiday excitement, make sure that your J-1 trainee/intern is prepared for any holiday travel that he/she will be doing.

During the J-1 program, participants are allowed to travel within the U.S. without requesting permission from the program sponsor. To travel internationally, J-1 participants need the following:

• The program end dates on the DS-2019 and J-1 visa cannot occur before or durring the travel outside the U.S.


• The J-1 participant must have a multiple entry visa (the letter "M" will be indicated under the word "Entries" on the J-1 visa.


• The DS-2019 must be signed by the program sponsor in the Travel Validation Section.

To grant travel validation, Global Current needs the original DS-2019, a statement of where, when and why the participant is traveling, the travel validation fee and a prepaid waybill or stamped self-addressed envelope so that we can send the approved document back. We recommend that all travel validation requests be submitted at least 2 weeks prior to travel date. If an emergency arises and we are not able to sign the DS-2019 before she leaves the U.S. then the DS-2019 can be sent directly to us for the signature and we will send it to an address abroad so that she can enter on the validated form.

The travel validation will expire after one year and will need to be renewed after that for international travel.

Now that everything is taken care of, I give you permission to enjoy the holidays :) Happy Thanksgiving!

J-1 Program Evaluations

J-1 sponsors are required to collect program evaluations from you and your J-1 candidate. Most of the time the supervisor and the trainee/intern have highly functional and effective relationships that earn high scores on program evaluations. On the rare occasion that we receive an evaluation reporting dissatisfaction, we act immediately.


As a J-1 sponsor, our main objective is to resolve the issue as quickly and effectively as possible, allowing the program to continue through to its completion. Often dissatisfaction will stem from communication issues, where one party (supervisor or participant) has specific expectations that are not being met and he/she is unsure how to communicate his/her concerns and resolve the problem. Cultural communication differences will exacerbate this problem. Our first action is to suggest him/her to meet with the supervisor/participant to discuss and reconcile expectations and improve the working situation. We do not typically get involved until all options are exhausted and it is clear that a change must be made.

We will get involved immediately only if there it is an emergency situation. Yikes!


If a company is not following through with the plan described in the DS-7002, then we will often work with the host company to help them get back on track. However, if the company is unresponsive to our efforts, then we typically allow participants to apply for a host company transfer. For a transfer, he or she will locate another host company that is able to adhere to his/her program plan and start the program where it was left off. In the case that the participant is not holding up his/her end of the agreement and is unresponsive to our efforts to rectify the problem, then we are forced to end the program.

Your sponsor is there to support you throughout the J-1 program. Though most issues can be resolved internally, we are always available for support when all other options have been exhausted.

Global Current Newsletter!

Check out Global Current's November Newsletter and learn how to evaluate a company's eligibility to host a J-1 program.

Do J-1 Participants Pay Taxes?

"Certainty? In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes." - Benjamin Franklin

Ben Franklin was a wise man.

Yes, J-1 intern and trainee participants do pay taxes while in the U.S. They will pay some but not all taxes that U.S. citizens/residents pay, including city state and federal taxes. J-1 participants are not required to pay FICA (Social Security and Medicare Tax) or FUTA (Federal Unemployment Tax).

In the Global Current Welcome Packet, we include instructions on how to complete the W-4. The instructions we provide are intended to prevent him/her from owing any taxes at the end of the year.

Remind J-1 participants that they will need to file a Federal Tax Return and possibly a State Tax Return in order to receive any money that was withheld from the stipend that is due back to him/her. This is often the last thing on a participant's mind if they finish the program before tax season or if they are participating in a program that spans over two calendar years. Please let them know that filing a return is mandatory for each year that they participate in a J-1 program.

To make filing easier for our participants, Global Current provides information for a filing service called Taxback.com.

Tick-tock - J1 Interview Wait Times

Congratulations! Your J-1 sponsorship application was approved and you now have the DS-2019 in hand. The next step is to make a J-1 interview appointment at your local U.S. consulate/embassy. Some consulates have especially high traffic and long wait times so we suggest that you call your local U.S. embassy/consulate or visit the Department of State website for more information on wait times.

If you are operating on a tight timeline, you may want to check consular wait times prior to receiving the DS-2019. That way you can make an appointment in advance or schedule an appointment at another nearby consulate/embassy. If you decide to schedule the appointment before the DS-2019 is issued, we recommend that you plan for at least three weeks from the day your application is submitted to the day you receive the DS-2019, assuming that you are taking advantage of Global Current’s 48 hour turnaround time.

Some embassies/consulates require a SEVIS ID to schedule an appointment. If this is the case, you must wait until the DS-2019 is issued before you can schedule an appointment. Your SEVIS ID number is issued with your DS-2019. Global Current is can email you your SEVIS ID number as soon as we issue the DS-2019 form.

The Place of Exchange in Public Diplomacy

Exchange holds an important place in our hearts, and we are very excited to see it take a central role in U.S. public diplomacy. As a J-1 sponsor we have been able to witness the tremendous impact of J-1 exchange programs on the lives of thousands of people and we are confident that these programs will not dissappoint as a tool to promote international understanding and cooperation.

At the launch of the Public Diplomacy Collaborative at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, Judith McHale, Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, spoke about the new strategies being implemented by the current administration to make U.S. diplomatic efforts more effective. President Obama and Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, are engaging other countries in a different way, encouraging an open dialogue and directly addressing damaging myths about the United States that have taken root abroad. Judith McHale, then goes on to champion exchange as an important component of the Obama Administration's diplomatic efforts. She recognizes the profound effect that exchange programs can have on the lives of individuals and how an individual's viewpoint can ripple out and affect thousands of others.

Global Current is proud to be a part of the movement to promote exchange and we encourage all J-1 participants and host companies to recognize their integral role in making exchange programs happen and how these exchange programs fit into a larger effort to facilitate international understanding and cooperation.

Yay Exchange!!

New DS-7002!!

A new DS-7002 has been released on the Department of State's website!

Keep your shirt on. The new DS-7002 is pretty similar to the old one. The new form has improvements in format and small improvements in content. Requests for program information that were irrelevant or misleading have been replaced with more clear and pertinent information requests.

Before having any substantial experience with the form, it seems that the only field that could cause confusion for our customers contains the choices for the J-1 program type. The choices are trainee, intern and student intern. For Global Current J-1 intern and trainee programs, only the intern and trainee boxes should be marked. The student intern is for students doing internships at a university in the U.S. This should not be confused with interns that are currently enrolled in a university outside the U.S. completing an internship in the United States at a host company/organization.

We are still working on incorporating the new form into our application. We will provide updates as the new updated application is released, however we do encourage all of our customers to begin using the new DS-7002 immediately.