Employment

Volunteering and unpaid internships

F-1/J-1 students

Whether an F-1 student requires work authorization is not governed by whether the student is paid. An F-1 student needs work authorization even for unpaid work. Therefore, an F-1 student should obtain either CPT or OPT work authorization to engage in unpaid work.

Only if the work is properly "volunteer" unpaid work under the Department of Labor rules can an F-1 student perform work without work authorization. To be eligible to gain experience without work authorization there may be no compensation of any kind, which could include meals, transportation, etc. and the position may not violate any U.S. or state labor laws.

Volunteering refers to donating time with an organization whose primary purpose is charitable or humanitarian in nature, and doing so without compensation of any kind.

Some examples of true volunteer work that would not need work authorization include helping serve food at a homeless shelter, cleaning out cages at an animal shelter, sorting food at a food pantry, and handing out water at a marathon.

Labor Laws

American labor laws protect workers from working without pay except in certain specific and defined situations. It is important to understand that workers cannot give away their right to receive pay. If the work being done benefits the company and is work that someone would normally be paid for, then that work most likely does not qualify to be considered an unpaid internship or volunteer work.

  WARNING

An international student who works at an unpaid internship or volunteer opportunity which is later found to not properly be unpaid work will have violated status.  

When considering volunteering or doing an unpaid internship, international students should be very careful to make sure that the internship really meets all seven of the criteria established by the U.S. Department of Labor:

  1. The extent to which the intern and the employer clearly understand that there is no expectation of compensation. Any promise of compensation, express or implied, suggests that the intern is an employee—and vice versa.
  2. The extent to which the internship provides training that would be similar to that which would be given in an educational environment, including the clinical and other hands-on training provided by educational institutions.
  3. The extent to which the internship is tied to the intern’s formal education program by integrated coursework or the receipt of academic credit.
  4. The extent to which the internship accommodates the intern’s academic commitments by corresponding to the academic calendar.
  5. The extent to which the internship’s duration is limited to the period in which the internship provides the intern with beneficial learning.
  6. The extent to which the intern’s work complements, rather than displaces, the work of paid employees while providing significant educational benefits to the intern.
  7. The extent to which the intern and the employer understand that the internship is conducted without entitlement to a paid job at the conclusion of the internship.

Fact Sheet #71: Internship Programs Under The Fair Labor Standards Act

No, we cannot provide a letter. If you wish to obtain official permission to do an unpaid internship, please apply for CPT or OPT.

A student should obtain CPT authorization for all unpaid internships, whether the student does or does not need to provide employment authorization documents to the company. Since the need for work authorization is not determined solely on whether an opportunity is paid or unpaid, F-1 students risk a violation of their status if they do not obtain proper work authorization. Therefore, to avoid the risk of an unauthorized employment status violation, we recommend obtaining CPT or OPT work authorization.

 WARNING

Before doing any work, you should ask what paperwork the organization requires from you to start your unpaid internship. If they want you to complete an I-9 Employment Authorization Verification form, it means they consider it to be an employment relationship requiring authorization even if you are not being paid.

No. We can only provide social security letters for authorized paid employment opportunities.

You should get documentation from the organization where you are engaging in the unpaid internship or volunteer activity explaining the nature and terms of your work, and keep this with your other immigration records.