On December 27,
2004, the Department of Labor (DOL) published the replacement
regulations for the Permanent Employment of Aliens in the U.S. This
new Program Electronic Review Management system (PERM)
revolutionized the basic labor certification process. The program
also changed the name from “Special handling” to “Optional Special
Recruitment and Documentation Procedures” (hereinafter referred to
as “Special Recruitment.”.
Special Recruitment can be pursued under the following circumstances
when the employer selected the alien for a teaching position, such
as professors, pursuant to a competitive recruitment and
selection process for which the alien was found to be more qualified
than any of the U.S. workers who applied for the job and the
application is field within 18 months after a selection was made.
The benefit for special recruitment is that even if there are
minimum qualified U.S. workers who are willing, able to take the
job, your labor certification application is still approvable if you
can prove that you were the best qualified candidates among all of
the applicants. In contrast to "regular labor certification
application," one must document that there are no minimum qualified
U.S. workers who are willing and able to take the job.
