Molly Sirigiri teaches biological sciences at Cossatot Community College.
By The American Bazaar Staff
WASHINGTON, DC: In a case that reaffirms the power of the local community, politicians and the church in swaying the mind of the Department of Homeland Security in immigration issues, a teacher from India who taught at a community college in Nashville, Arkansas on an H-1B visa, and was deported after going on an overseas trip without getting the necessary paperwork in place for an extension of her visa, is back at work.
Sirigiri, from Andhra Pradesh, who is on the faculty of the biological sciences department of the Cossatot Community College attached to the University of Arkansas, in Nashville, was detained at the Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas, on July 8 while returning to the United States from a mission trip to Guatemala, reported the Nashville leader. She had gone on a week-long First Baptist Church mission trip to a Guatemala orphanage.
Sirigiri was on an H-1B visa, but had reportedly traveled out of the country after she had applied for an extension of her visa, papers of which she had yet to receive at the time of her departure to Guatemala.
After being detained for 24 hours, Sirigiri was deported to India.
According to reports in the Arkansas Times and Leader, Sirigiri was teaching at the college since 2011 on an H-1B visa. She was a popular teacher who was well-liked in the community for her outreach with the church as well. When she was deported there was a swell of sympathy for her, including from the church and individuals in the area who wanted to wire her money in India to take care of her needs. The community college also were stunned by the developments, especially when thousands of illegal immigrants continued to cross into the country, and the case of Sirigiri they felt was a ‘non-porous’ border crossing.
The college, church and community all got behind Sirigiri’s case and worked with the offices of Sen. Mark Pryor and Sen. John Boozman to secure her return to the US. One of the points raised was that Sirigiri was not told at the domestic airport when she traveled that she could not get back.
The Department of Homeland Security gave in to their demands, and issued that Sirigiri could get back into the country if she applied for a fresh H-1B visa. The college did that, paying a premium processing fee, which meant that her case was adjudicated with 15 days.
And one and a half months after she was deported, Sirigiri landed in Arkansas on August 22, and joined her teaching duties on August 25. She joined church services in the area two days later after she arrived, reports said. In all, she had missed one week of classes, which other teachers took care off for her.
In a statement, Cossatot Community College Chancellor Steve Cole said: “Molly is a special person to UA Cossatot. Not only is she a teaching rock star for us, but more importantly, she is a vital part of her Church and community. The best possible result came from this, and that was her quick re-entry back into the United States.”
Sirigiri said in statement: “I am thankful to be back in Nashville and teaching. I am very thankful for people I consider my family in the United States.”
Sirigiri has bachelors and masters degrees in English and microbiology from the University of Osmania in Hyderabad.
13 Comments
Good going! It is nice of the community to value teachers and their faculty. Many teachers and faculty are poorly paid, over worked and under appreciated. I know. I was one of them, and I was teaching and doing research at top universities in the US.
It is nice to see this community valuing its good teachers. Legal immigrants having to file all these cumbersome forms just to go abroad for a few days or a week. It has become ridiculous. There are criminals and traffickers who are being let in, and who find it easy to get visas by paying the right person in the system. They just caught a guy with border security who had made hundreds of thousands of dollars to let people in without legal papers. To harass one teacher over a paper oversight is ridiculous. This Tennessee community has its priorities right: valuing education and educators.
Does it costalot to go to Cossatot?
Is this special treatment for church goers? If the lady was not Christian than she probably would have not gotten this special treatment. Separation of church and state anyone?
American jobs for American citizens. The rest of you should go back to your home country.
Back when I was in Dubai, lots of Indians lost their jobs due to copyright enforcement and competition from American multi-nationals. Back then it was ‘free market competition’, now that the same is happening to you, you’re doing the second best thing whites are good at: whining (the first being stealing – except that you legitimize your theft by writing it into law and legalizing it – same as your corruption). Don’t worry once China dumps the Dollar and turns the US into a third world country, most Indian immigrants will leave of their own accord. Then you can engage in the third best you ‘civilized’ people are good at: going on shooting sprees at malls/ schools.
The average IQ is India is 82. 82!!! The average in China is 106. The average Euro-descendant has an average of 100. If it wasn’t the west standing in the way, China probably would have OWNED India decades ago. Once Chinese learn English better, India will have NO market for IT, support calls, anything.
This is a joke or something? If China owned India, we’d be better off – instead of a vassal state of the US who picks fights with it’s neighbours! Plus increases in IQ are linked to better education, nutrition and standard of living – once China dumps the Dollar and crashes the economy – I’ll bet IQs will fall. Hey, you voted for Trump (still better than Hillary) but then you’re not doing the smart thing and dumping BOTH the corrupt Dems and Repubs – you keep voting in the same idiots and then wonder why your country isn’t getting any better. All that flouride they’re pumping into the water doesn’t help either! Then again your response didn’t answer the gist of m argument: Your blatant hypocrisy and refusal to acknowlege blowback for your collective past sins!
With all of that low IQ of Indians why worry about Indians taking jobs from Americans? You should simply sleep in peace knowing that they don’t have enough smarts to take over your jobs – LOL
Anyways, there is no IQ data as no one has ever taken IQ tests for an entire country like India or China. In any case, you should know that India produces an amount of Engineers, Doctors, Chartered Accountants, Lawyers and other professionals in one year – equivalent to what US does in 10 years. So much for false IQ equivalency.
Another fact – over 30% of US doctors are Indians, 2 Governors, 5 Congressman, 1 Senator is Indian origin. Also check out the Indian CEOs – Citi, Google, Microsoft, PepsiCo just to name a few.
If you still are not convinced just walk up to any school with even 10% indian student population and you will realize their test averages are much higher then any other school with non indian kids…
From what I have seen, I would guess the average IQ of the so-called Euro-descendants to be 10, not 100. Most Americans don’t even know how to write grammatically correct English; forget about skilled jobs!
I am from China, and nobody from the West has stood in our way. You white vermin are too powerless to even defend your border, much less the South China Sea. One wrong move, and your entire fleet could get wiped out within a matter of minutes. Both India and China know what it’s like to have white invaders washing up on their shores for centuries. If you ever go back to your old ways, you would literally get nuked out of existence. Tread carefully now..
James – Did you just make up your Alt-Facts? Hmm … don’t let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya.
James, I am not even sure why I am bothering to respond to your ridiculous claim. I was an educator at the university level for many years, and that too with a Ph.D from America’s top university.
There is no IQ record for entire nations, not even in the US. We don’t even know what is the average IQ of Harvard graduates, Stanford graduates or USC graduates. The only indirect measure for International Students are the GREs, CATs or/and SATs…and they score very high, many could be Mensa members, especially those at the graduate level at America’s top universities. At the national level…we don’t know.
Even at the school level we make assumptions about the quality of the school on “the number of students who graduate, number of students who go to college from that school and number of students who graduate with honors”….That is not a direct IQ test.
If you go by students’ performance in Math and Science tests then students in Finland score the highest. Chinese students on these tests are ranked 6th or 7th globally…though they have moved up quickly. US is ranked low…lower than some Middle Eastern and African countries. This has been a serious issue for many educators and policy planners who fear for America’s future in global productivity, competitiveness and leadership.
Poor countries might have problems with poor nutrition that could affect brain development and IQ…but that is only true in some parts of India, and so too in some parts of China. There is no IQ record for Southern States, but they rank the lowest in educational indicators. In fact almost all Southern States, except for Texas, are very low in school performance, graduation and other skill competency tests.
Read up on the issues please…
Why do you Indians think it’s only you it happens to. It’s been happening for years to French, Irish, English people your hypersensitivity and inability to truly be part of something
American society shows.