Applying to an American University
As I am allowed to enroll in a double master’s degree program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM), I had the pleasure to fill out a lot of copies.
There are three organizational parts which are
- University/Enrollment
- Visum
- Applying as a teaching assistant at the Maths faculty of the UWM
So I will go through the parts step by step.
1. University
First I had to create an account at the graduateschool-apply portal of the UWM. I then needed verification of my ability to understand and speak the English language (successful TOEFL or IELTS test). Besides that, I had to write a “Reason statement” which includes my experience and the reason I want to study at the UWM, and get 3 recommendation letters from professors.
After I got an okay for my dual degree application I got an offer from the Math faculty to work as a Teaching Assistant with 50% which would cover my university tution too.
To finish the University application I then had to provide a “proof of funding” to prove that I am rich enough to study at an American university. As my Teaching Assistant (TA) offer covers my tuition, I happily got this very quickly.
I then had to provide a copy of my EU passport so that they can verify my existence and then they sent a I-20 form across the great ocean to the place where I currently live.
I could have chosen if I want to pay for the shipping myself and make it express shipping or if I just want standard shipping (paid by the UWM). Interestingly I received the form 3 days later even though they paid for it.
2. Visum
I had to fill out forms that I have not been to a few critical countries in the last years, what my personal gender is and what ethnic group I belong to.
This is the part I have to do for the Visum.
3. Applying as a TA at the UWM
Probably standard in the US but very weird for me as a German citizen is a so-called “Criminal Background Check”.
As all steps in the application process (UWM Portal, TOEFL program, GIS …) you get a very old web portal where you have to make a number of dubious decisions.
For example, signing a document with a handwritten signature you made with your trackpad or your mouse.
Notice that you have to consent twice before by clicking fancy checkboxes.
By doing so, you consent to no less than:
“I hereby authorize GIS and UWM to obtain criminal and other records about me from any source for the purpose of evaluating my employability for the position I have applied for. I also authorize UWM to provide such records to third parties for the same purpose. Such third parties and the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System, its agents, employees, and officers, including UWM, are hereby released of any liability that may arise from the disclosure of such information. I understand that if I wish to discuss or negotiate the terms of this release, I may email CBC-HR@uwm.edu.”
You actually have no choice which makes this whole process very useless and bureaucratic. If you want to apply, you have to consent, else you are withdrawn from consideration.
After allowing them to check your whole background story and get information about all the places you lived at in the last 7 years, you still have to sign a normal document with a handwritten signature and send it back to them.
“Your information will be collected, used and stored only to assess your suitability for the Purpose and may include, but is not limited to, verification of your education and employment history, identity, criminal, civil and credit history, to the extent allowable by law.”
This really does not sound very trustworthy and I wished I could get a way to apply without doing so but sadly this process is mandatory. Besides that, it is overly complicated and could be a simple web form that is signed by a scan of your signature (once).
Gladly they provide the information they got about me for free so I can see if they found anything.
“You may request a copy of your screening report by making a subject-access request to The Company, or by sending an email to compliance@geninfo.com or by mail at General Information Services”
I am very interested in those records and will update this post accordingly.
Considering that probably every American person once in their life has to go through such a screening and they are probably saving all their data for legal reasons. This is probably the reason why it is done by a company and not by the government itself. Because the government is not allowed to randomly save data without a reason, but companies are and have to provide any information to the government.
If only the information gotten by such a service would be of any use to fight crimes at all… I hope that the information stored there is just not valuable anymore when they get hacked or someone in their company clicks a wrong attachment and the data of millions of citizens gets leaked.