To: Wellesley College Community
From: Courtney Coile, Provost and Lia Gelin Poorvu ’56 Dean of the College, and Carolyn Slaboden, Chief Human Resources Officer
Re: Response to questions about impact of strike on visa status of employees
Date: April 25, 2025
With the end of the WOAW-UAW strike yesterday, we had hoped we would not be writing to you again quite so soon. However, we find it necessary to respond to a rumor that is circulating that the College threatened to report noncitizen union employees to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
This is false. The College has not threatened union members, and it has not “weaponized” the visa status of any noncitizen employees. But the occurrence of a strike did create risk for some noncitizen employees.
By law, the College must report a strike by our employees to the U.S. Department of Labor within three days of the occurrence of the strike. The law allows the labor department to provide notice of a strike to DHS, and any petition to extend or change an employee’s H-1B, H-1B1, or E-3 visa status may be denied while a strike is ongoing. This risk applies to all employees in the occupational category of the striking workers, which includes both tenure track and non-tenure track faculty. The stated purpose of the law is to protect striking workers by ensuring that an employer is not hiring noncitizen workers to do the jobs of striking employees.
Early in the strike, the College carefully reviewed the visa status of each impacted noncitizen faculty member and communicated with them directly about whether the strike could affect their current visa status and/or renewal. We invited affected employees to follow up with the College’s immigration attorney with any questions about their individual situations.
Now that the strike has ended, the College is working with the impacted faculty members to move their visa petitions forward on an expedited basis.
We encourage any community member who has questions or concerns about this issue or other serious matters to bring them to us directly, so that we may provide the information you need to make informed judgments.