I legally entered the US from my home country of Canada in Jul 2010, under a valid F-1 Visa w/ a 4-year I-20.
Digression: My school was able to issue this I-20 because of it's authorization to do so by Immigration. However, now, due to what I presume are new regulations, the school has been demanded to meet certain criteria to maintain their ability to issue I-20s. We meet all of these requirements, except being able to produce letters written by other accredited schools that admit that they accepted our students and honoured our credits. Several schools have, but for whatever reason, they will not right these letters.
Now, due to the school's inability to produce these letters, their authorization number that allows them to issue I-20s has been revoked. This leads me to my first two questions:
1. Am I now "Out of Status", even though I am still enrolled and active in the school?
2. Is there a grace period that allows me to begin the "Adjustment of Status"?
I have been engaged to my USC fiancée for little over 3 months, and we've been in an active romantic relationship for 18 months (+ 3 days at the time of this letter). We were originally planning on getting married next June (June 7th, 2014) involving a big ceremony in my home church in Baton Rouge, LA, but because of this situation, we are considering doing whatever we can to get married within the next few weeks. We are prepared to do this, but the timing is a little awkward (which doesn't matter due to necessity).
The reason it is awkward is because we are both in college in 2 separate states. She is in MO and I am in LA. We have not lived together yet, and if we get married in a few weeks, we STILL won't be living together (though she will be moving to LA to live with me after her nursing program completes). This leads me to my next two questions:
3. Can I adjust my status from my F-1 / "Possible out-of-status F-1" outside of marriage?
4. If (#3) is not possible, what (all) will I need to do to adjust my status according to marriage?
My main question, to whoever feels confident that they have enough information for me:
5. Describe to me, in as much detail as possible, what I will need to do to remain in the US.
Additional info:
I should add that I am working on-campus a P/T job (F/T while school is on break, out for summer, etc.). This job (Computer programming/Video Editing) is not related to my field of study (Theology), and so a work visa seems improbable, though my employer is highly interested in doing whatever they can to keep me.
I plan on remaining in the US and raising a family while I continue to work where I am working, and even hope to be eventually teaching in the College (I am in Seminary, working towards Master's Certificate in Theology).
