Just came back from a citizenship interview in Jacksonville, FL.
Timescale:
-- N400 filed August 2002 with the Texas Service Center;
-- Fingerprints taken February 2003;
-- Interview February 2004.
The interview itself was a formality. A thorough check of all the
info. given in N400, and update of foreign travels since filing N400,
a one-sentence exam of reading English and a one-sentence exam of
writing English. The US history and government structure test consisted
of 10 questions chosen randomly by a computer from the standard set
of 100 questions available on the Web. 6 good answers out of the ten
makes you pass. I made one error: instead of the principal idea of
the Declaration of Independence being "All men are created equal" I
said "All people..." An advice: when quoting the Constitution, Bill
of Rights or similar, quote _verbatim_, do _not_ interpret. Still,
I had 6 good answers out of the first 7 questions, so the test was
over.
The USCIS officer was very kind and courteous, so it was not a
stressful experience at all. It took 20 minutes.
I was told that now there would be a final check (byt the FBI?) and
I should expect an invitation to an oath ceremony within 1-2 months.
Given the timescale between filing the N400 and the interview (18
months), I'm a bit sceptical, but will wait.
My 14-year old relationship with the INS (now USCIS) seems to be
coming to an end. One word of advice to those following the same
path: stay away from immigration lawyers unless your case is
untypical and there are some complications in sight. I've used
their service twice during those years, and both time they screwed
up badly (once when changing from J1 to H1, the other when
filing the green card petition). It turned out I could have
done it better myself, based in part on input from this group,
and I would have had ca. $2,500 extra in my pocket.
Best luck to all of you,
jrk011@poczta.gazeta.pl
(Will gladly answer any extra questions -- I'm really thankful
to this group for advice, and this includes you, Ingo, although
I disagree with you in general about the lawyers.) |