Licensing Through
Dental Board of California
Dental Board of California
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Dentist. First the dentist must find a way to get a green card. Retraining as a nurse will meet that objective. Once they get their green card and are working in the US as a registered nurse, they can consider taking steps necessary to becoming a licensed dentists. We will seek the job offer in California, so unless the nurse obtains his or her own job offer in another state, then assume person will be working in California, at least from start. Presently to sit for the California dental licensing examination the “Foreign Trained Dentist” must meet certain requirements See summary of state educational requirements for international dentists Essentially these are the minimum requirements for California;
Our pursuing the approval from the DBC is entirely independent or our nurse retraining programs. On behalf of licensed California dentists, whom I represent, we intend to vigorously seek these approvals by the DBC, and we are prepared to finance the cost of the approvals. We can expect that it will take us up to four years to obtain the approvals, based on the length of time it took the Mexican school to be approved. Dentists enrolling in our nurse retraining program starting September 2008, can expect that it will take 2 years (from when they start nurse program) to pass all exams and receive their CGFNS Certificates. At that time a US employer can make them a job offer (I-140 petition) to come to work for it with a green card. Allot 12 months from when US employer petitions nurse to green card interview at US consulate. Once nurse arrives in US she MUST work for at least 6 months to one year for petitioning US employer, as a registered nurse. Dentists starting our nurse retraining program should expect to arrive in the US within 3 years, or September 2010. The dentist must work for at least 6 months to one year as registered nurse for retention of green card purposes. Dentists can expect that four years will elapse from when dentists starts our nurse retraining program, to when they are free to leave the employment of the petitioning US employer and seek other employment or pursue full time study. Your advantage is that you will have your green card, which you earned legally so you don’t have any apprehensions of losing. At that time (4-years) you can consider enrolling into an IDP. Your options are the 5 California schools or the one school in Mexico which offer these 2 year certification programs. At the end of your successful completion of the 2-year certification IDP you can sit for DBC licensing examination. If you pass the exam, you can immediately start practicing dentistry in California! Consider the dental doctor THAT DOES NOT HAVE THE GREEN CARD! Dentists can enroll into one of the California schools offering the IDP, but will need an F-1 nonimmigrant student visa. Or the Mexican school which will also require a student visa. Upon completion of the IDP course the dentist is qualified to sit for the DBC licensing exam. If successful the dentist becomes licensed as a dentist in the State of California. But the dental license does not authorize you to work or remain in the US. It is not a green card which authorizes you to reside permanently and work in the US. It is a dental license that permits you to practice dentistry in the US, but you must still have a non- immigrant status to work, e.g. H1-B visa or permanent resident visa. The permanent resident visa (green card) requires that the California licensed doctor find a job offer from another US dentist or dental clinic and undergo the Labor Certification process, get certified under that job offer and be subject to the 3rd preference employment based immigrant classification. Registered nurses are also subject to the 3rd preference employment based category, but nurses are exempt from the Labor Certification process because they are Schedule A listed, see Green cards for doctors. One way to view these options is to consider:
As stated we have proposed to the St Petersburg State University Faculty of Medicine Dental School to cooperate in seeking approval from the DBC. This is a resubmission of my proposal made to the dental school 5 years ago. The difference in the proposal is that I am now in California and I and my group of California licensed dentists have proposed to fully finance the cost of having the DBC approve the programs at the St Petersburg State University. In exchange in obtaining said approvals, we request that we be granted the exclusive right to enroll foreign educated doctors into the program. As indicated we expect process to take four years. We make no guarantees to anyone that programs will ever be approved for St Petersburg State University by DBC. If approval process is started and if it results in the IDP being approved by the DBC, then we will give preference to dentists who obtained their green cards through our nurse retraining programs. |